Measurements in airblast. Part A. Optical temperature measurement. Part B. Novel measurement techniques. Final report, 28 February--1 October 1977

Part A: Measurement of temperatures generated in extreme explosive environments presents considerable experimental difficulties. Optical methods posses the unique advantage of permitting temperature measurements without disturbing the shock front or combustion process and exhibit the quick response time necessary to obtain temperature histories. The test results presented clearly indicate the feasibility of using one and two color pyrometers for effectively measuring the temperature-histories for an explosively developed airblast shock front. Part B: This study investigates the feasibility of two conceptual techniques to measure the density and temperature history of the shocked air along with a density history of any lofted debris entrained within the air shock in a nuclear driven shock tunnel. The first technique is a gas bag and pyrometer experiment which is actually a method for providing a clean 'window' into the air shock so that passive optical pyrometer equipment can be used to measure temperatures within the shock wave. The second technique is a radioisotope source method which uses two or more different frequency radioactive X-ray sources to measure areal density histories and tunnel wall translational displacement. Both techniques are clearly feasible from consideration of the basic physics concepts involved.