SUMMARY REPORT ON THE THEORY OF HYPERVELOCITY IMPACT

Abstract : This study is devoted primarily to solid-solid impact at velocities in the meteoric range. A continuous Eulerian hydrodynamic code is used to numerically integrate the flow equations for several series of impact problems. The impact velocity, the projectile shape, the density of the projectile, and the equation of state of the interacting materials are varied. Impact crater dimensions are found to increase as the 0.58 power of the impact velocity. Projectiles of the same mass but different densities have the same overall impact effects on the target, for velocities above about 10 to the 6th power cm/ sec. One-dimensional and axisymmetric impacts are also computed for materials with an ideal-gas equation of state. These calculations provide some important comparisons with analytical work on the problem of hypervelocity impact.