Warheads Flashcards
“to inflict damage on a target through the rapid transfer of energy from the warhead to the target”
Warhead
What are the parts of the missile warhead
Casing
Explosive Charge
Safety/Arming Devices
Fuses
Secondary damaging elements
Describe the Casing
Provides structure and may define the purpose (fragmentation)
Exploisves transferring destructive energy to the target?
Energy coupling.
Define yield
TNT Equivalent of the blast
1 Ton of TNT in GJ
4.184 GJ
Do missiles typically use interrupted or non-interrupted and why?
Interrupted - safety reasons
Describe Ambient Fuse
Activated by the environment surrounding the target.
Eg. Airburst fuse for nuclear ICBM which detonates at a certain air pressure corresponding to an alititude.
What are the gour general categories of missile fuses?
Timer/Command
Impact/Contact
Proximity
Ambient
“any element of the missile that increases the damage effect”
Eg. ball bearings, rods, darts, unspent fuel, missile body (kinetic). Other than fragmentation provided by casing.
Secondary damage elements.
Describe Shrapnel vs Fragmentation
Shrapnel: Ball of metal added to warhead to create a pattern or wall of metal when exploding
Fragments: The pieces created when the casing explodes.
What are 4 methods of energy coupling?
Thermal, Kinetic, Chemical, Nuclear
What are the factosr which affect the effectiveness of a warhead?
Target (location and defences)
Energy source of warhead (chemical, nuclear, kinetic, or thermal)
Efficiency of explosive agent
Loss of efficiency due to environmental conditions
Damage imparted to the target is related to 3 parameters:
Damage Volume
Attenuation
Propagation
“the volume of space surrounding the warhead within which it will have a destructive effectiveness”
Damage Volume
Describe attenuation
The reduction of the destructive potential per unit area as the blast expands
Describe propagation of a blast and the two types
“the manner in which the energy and material emitted by the blast travel through the medium”
What are the two broad categoreis of warheads?
Explosive Warheads (conventional, nuclear)
Special Purpose Warheads (unconventional)
Describe explosive warheads
Kinetic effects
What are 4 types of conventional missile warheads?
Blast Warheads
Fragmentation
Rod
Shaped Charge
Describe Blast effects including the shock wave and blast wind.
Explosion compresses air to peak over-pressure, transmitting a shock wave followed by a decline to atmospheric pressure.
The negative phase includes the blast expanding outward with such a force that the pressure declines to sub-atmospheric levels.
The blast wind then changes direction IOT equialize the pressure.
This generates a push-pull drag loading effect that will damage structures.
Describe how ground explosion shock waves change the blast effect?
The shock wave reflected off the ground will combine with the incident wave to form a third wave called the Mach wave which will have a higher peak over-pressure than the original shock wave.
Describe diffraction loading
As the shock wave wraps around teh sides of the target, it applies pressure to squeeze it and break it.
