INSTITUTE FOR ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY (IAT) The University of Texas at Austin Austin, Texas Research in Electrodynamics, Hypervelocity, Pulsed Power Web Site

Maxwell, ePhysics for high-power electromagnetic rail guns

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Founded in 1990, the Institute for Advanced Technology (IAT), at The University of Texas at Austin, is an autonomous research unit under the Office of the Vice President for Research. The Institute supports the Army with basic and applied research in electrodynamics, hypervelocity physics, pulsed power, and education in related critical technologies.

THE NEED
To understand how the rail-armature assembly electromagnetic design impacts mechanical stresses

THE SOLUTION
Maxwell®, ePhysics™

At Ansoft's Converge Applications Workshop for High-Performance Design, Marius Rosu, an applications engineer at Ansoft, demonstrated how the Institute for Advanced Technology at The University of Texas at Austin uses Maxwell and ePhysics to simulate high-power electromagnetic rail guns with all of their multi-domain interactions.

First, Rosu used electromagnetic finite-element analysis (FEA) to characterize the nonlinear effects of the rail gun using transient analysis to encompass the entire solution domain. Using this approach, Rosu was able to estimate the current density distribution on the "C-shaped" armature at start-up condition, to compute the incremental inductance from the magnetic energy variation, and to determine the force distribution at different locations over the rails cross-section in the armature vicinity.

For increased insight into the rail gun, Rosu used the results from the transient electromagnetic FEA solver as input conditions to mechanical stress 3D finite-element solver to evaluate the "C-shaped" armature mechanical deformation occurring during the start-up condition at the highest value of the current pulse.

Using the process that Rosu demonstrated, design engineers can examine the high currents in the rail-armature assembly and see how they impact the mechanical stresses of the design. By considering this information upfront in the design process, engineers can fully understand the rail gun and the interactions that result from using such high power.

Special thanks to John Mallick, a research scientist at the Institute for Advanced Technology at The University of Texas at Austin, for his collaboration with Rosu.

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