Improved Electrical Contact Materials for Extremely High Current Sliding Contact Materials

Our Phase II objective is to scale-up the advanced armature materials developed in Phase I to large bore railguns, with bore sizes as large as 120 mm and lengths up to 10 m. This will be accomplished through a proven methodology of Integrated Launch Package (ILP) development at IAP. During the baseline Phase II effort we will develop the processes demonstrated in Phase I and scale them first to the IAP Scale launcher then to the BAE/IAP Medium Cal launcher and then to the full scale 32 MJ Lab Launcher. Although this may be viewed as an aggressive approach for Phase II we feel that it is important to quickly scale the CNT enhanced and fiber enhanced armature materials to a full scale environment. Based on a successful demonstration in the 32 MJ Lab Launcher (LL), we will be in an excellent position to build ILP’s for future Navy tactical guns.