Abstract

Aiming at the reduction in penetration depth caused by the deformation and fracture of conventional 90W-Ni-Fe rod penetrators during ultra-high-velocity penetration, a lightweight tungsten-based ceramic alloy was fabricated in this study. Ballistics tests were conducted to verify the penetration performance of the novel lightweight alloy against concrete targets, and the existing theoretical penetration model was modified accordingly. The results indicate that, within the impact velocity range of 1400~1750 m/s, the penetration depth of both rod penetrators presents an initial increasing and subsequent decreasing trend, with an extreme value near 1625 m/s and a dimensionless penetration depth Xp/L close to 4. Compared with the traditional 90W-Ni-Fe alloy, the lightweight tungsten-based ceramic alloy penetrator achieves a mass reduction of 5.7%. In the impact velocity range from 1408.0 m/s to 1743.5 m/s, its penetration depth increases by 6.22%~10.58%, and the improvement becomes more significant with the increase in impact velocity. For the modified theoretical model, the predicted ultimate penetration depth of the lightweight alloy rod penetrator increases by 8.85%, while the average mass loss rate and average erosion rate decrease by 12.09% and 17.65%, respectively. The error between theoretical calculations and experimental data is within 5%.

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