Techniques for Performing Warhead Characterization

To provide the Armed Forces with accurate lethality assessments for fielded munitions, warhead characterization is performed in ground based arena and sled testing. The current procedures are time consuming and costly, while only producing a fraction of the desired data. In the current method, the device under test is surrounded by switch screens to record fragment impact time and bundles of foam insulation to capture fragments. Fragments must be recovered by hand to be weighed and measured, requiring weeks of labor. This process is time consuming and gives no way to correlate fragment mass and velocity. Additionally, only a fraction of the fragments are recovered. To meet the need for an automatic method of full hemisphere warhead fragmentation characterization, McQ will develop a system which replaces the ring of switch screens with a network of sensors containing high speed cameras. The system will record and analyze video of the warhead fragmentation then automatically produce a report describing the mass, size, speed, and trajectory of each fragment. The system will be capable of setup by two technicians in a matter of hours and will require no manual recovery or analysis of fragments after the test.