A team lead by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems has developed an electric-based, multi-mission railgun system that has better range than traditional gas-based munitions, a company official said yesterday.
The rail guns, developed by General Atomics, Boeing and General Dynamics, were presented yesterday at the Surface Navy Association Symposium in Arlington, Va. The larger rail gun, called the Advanced Containment Launcher, and its smaller cousin, the Blitzer, provide capability against air and surface threats, high altitude threats and land gargets. One round of the air burst projectile, launched via electricity instead of conventional gasoline, provides the lethality equivalent of 24 rounds from 20 mm CIWS at muzzle and five rounds of 30 mm AHEAD at 100 meters.
Tom Hurn, General Atomics’ director of railgun programs, said conventional gas-based weapons are limited by the speed of sound with temperature and pressure defining how far the round can travel. But because GA’s railguns are electric-based, the munitions can be launched two to three times the speed of sound, which can be a huge advantage.
“So there’s tremendous advantages in as far as range, capabilities you can initiate as far as hitting a target,” Hurn said. “Also because of engagement speeds at impact, the kinetic effects are high enough where a lot of times we don’t need high explosives or anything for the effectiveness we need to be valid.”
Because of the higher speeds of impact, the GA railgun also provides a deeper magazine via smaller munitions. Hurn did not specify how small the munition is, saying it depends on the size of the railgun. To power the railgun, Hurn said the power source puts a gigawatt of power into the gun for a 0.005 second shot, roughly, depending on the size of the gun. To generate this level of power, Hurn said the railgun uses pulse power, which is the process of storing up energy through a source and dumping that energy into the gun intermittently using capacitors.
Hurn said GA also manufactures the capacitors, making the railgun energy production process as precise as possible.
“We are an organization that takes those (capacitors) and integrates them into the module that not only provides the energy but shapes the manner and controls the energy the way we need to,” Hurn said.
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