A plasma railgun experiment addressing launch-to-space issues

The Institute for Advanced Technology has recently been awarded a grant by the U.S. Air Force Office of Scientific Research to undertake research in the area of hypervelocity, plasma-driven electromagnetic launch. This paper describes our technical approach to achieving 7 km/s at accelerations that are lower than typical for plasma launchers. Our approach to managing plasma restrike and secondary arc formation is to reduce the emission of ablated materials into the gun bore through the use of augmentation and ceramic sidewalls. In addition, preinjection to 1 km/s is used to provide an initial velocity for the launch package while introducing minimal dense cold gas, since such gas can also contribute to restrike. This paper describes the hardware that is being put in place for this experiment.