Common Gravity Dropped Small Weapon Electronic Safe Arm Fuze (ESAF)

The objective of this project is to develop innovative means to effectively enable Safe/Arm (S/A) functionally within gravity dropped small weapons. Several concepts have been developed and their feasibility demonstrated during the Phase I of this project. Methods have also been developed for their optimal design. The developed concepts are suitable for weapons dropped from any altitude. Fully electronic concepts are proposed that operate without the need of batteries or external power sources by generating their required electrical energy. The proposed electronics circuitry and logics would then provide the desired S/A functionalities as well as certain other fuzing functionalities. The concepts are particularly safe since their electronics circuitry and logics have no available power prior to the weapon release. The project involves extensive dynamics and structural modeling and simulation and prototype development and testing to validate the developed models and determine the performance of each device. The proposed concepts are particularly suitable for miniaturization and low-cost production since they can be manufactured using well established mass fabrication techniques and equipment. BENEFIT: The development of the proposed concepts for “safe” and “arm” (S/A) functionalities is essential for the development of low-cost, safe, small fuzing for gravity dropped small weapons with significantly reduced collateral damage and UXO. Such no-battery, self-powered electronic “safe” and “arm” (S/A) devices will have a wide range of dual use commercial and other military applications. On the military side, they could be used on a wide range of weapons to reduce cost and increase safety, reduce collateral damage and UXO. On the commercial side, they could be used to initiate remote wireless sensors used for diagnostics, emergency detection, and for other similar purposes.