A Method of Maintaining the Orientation of a Plane Impactor Accelerated in a High-Pressure Gas Channel

Abstract

The task of accelerating a thin plane impactor in a cylindrical channel with high-pressure gas (in particular, detonation products of acetylene–oxygen fuel mixture) encounters the well-known problem of “falling paper sheet” since the impactor motion in the channel is also unstable with respect to lateral (radial) displacements. This displacement can lead to breakage of the symmetry of flight, skewness of the impactor, and a sharp decrease in the achieved velocity. It has been experimentally established that the impactor orientation can be retained by limitation of its lateral shifts with the aid of several thin filaments of a polymer thread (fishing line) arranged uniformly on the inner channel surface along the cylinder generatrix.