Experimental investigation of a hydrogen plasma railgun

This paper reports that the plasma velocity and temperature and composition distributions in a hydrogen plasma railgun were measured. Typical velocities near the muzzle were ∼95 km/s at an initial capacitor bank stored energy of 4.1 kJ. Temperatures ranged from a peak of ∼24000 K in the current-carrying plasma, to ∼85000 K in the tail. The current-carrying plasma was composed of roughly equal parts of hydrogen and copper. Also, computer modeling of armature B probe signals has yielded a simple interpretation of the signal