Contactless induction acceleration of conductors up to hypersonic speeds

Non-US electrodynamic launchers research and development

“…Velocities of about 1 km/s were achieved with 10-to 30-g projectiles with an electromechanical efficiency of 43 percent. Higher velocities up to 5 km/s with masses of 1 to 2 grams were reported by Bondaletov andIvanov in 1975 and. These papers also indicate that the main application of these accelerators was penetration mechanics research.…”

“…Methods of measuring hypervelocities were described briefly in an early paper from the Istra division (Bondaletov and Ivanov, 1975). Two methods were used: high-speed photography, and a contact method called the capacitor-probe method.…”

Studies of a very high efficiency electromagnetic launcher

“…An investigation of the results achieved by the Russian team indicates that their projectile velocity measurement had an error of between 5% and 10% [11], leading to a possible error in the efficiency of more than 10%. No comparable estimate can be made for the UK results, but numerical modelling predictions at Loughborough have shown good agreement with experimental data, once reasonable assumptions had been made concerning the input data [12,13].…”