DEVELOPMENT OF A PRESSURE AND TEMPERATURE TRANSDUCER FOR 100 KILOBAR EXPLOSIVE ENVIRONMENTS

THE OBJECTIVE OF THIS PROPOSAL IS TO DEVELOP A HIGH-ACCURACY, HIGH-RANGE PRESSURE AND TEMPERATURE TRANSDUCER FOR THE MEASURMENT OF RAPID TRANSIENTS TO 100 KILOBARS AND TEMPERATURES TO 2500 K IN UNDERWATER EXPLOSION BUBBLES. ALL MEASURING FUNCTIONS WILL BE PERFORMED BY ONE SMALL (ABOUT 20 MM IN DIAMETER) SENSOR UNIT. THE PRESSURE IS DETECTED BY CAPACITIVE METHODS USING A THICK, RUGGED METAL MEMBRANE. THE SENSOR CAN OPERATE AT TEMPERATURES OF 2500 K. THE EXPLOSION TEMPERATURE IS SIMULTANEOUSLY MEASURED BY A SMALL HIGH-ACCURACY, HIGH-SPEED RADIATION DETECTOR CAPABLE OF DETECTING TEMPERATURES TO 3000 K AND INTEGRATED IN THE PRESSURE SENSOR UNIT. A MICROCOMPUTER WITH A HIGH-SPEED REAL-TIME INTERFACE SAMPLES THE PRESSURE AND TEMPERATURE DATA. AS THE ONLY MOVING PART IS THE MEMBRANE, WITH A MAXIIMUM DISPLACEMENT OF 5 UM, IT IS EXPECTED THAT THE TRANSDUCER SYSTEM WILL BE QUITE RUGGED AND CAPABLE OF WITHSTANDING LARGE TEMPERATURE VARIATIONS AS WELL AS OVERLOADS UP TO TWICE ITS NOMINAL RANGE.