Modeling a spacecraft fracture mechanism occurring as a result of its metal components inertial explosion at collision

Аuthors

Marakhtanov M. K., Veldanov V. A.^*, Dukhopel'nikov D. V.^**, Karneichik A. S.^***, Krutov I. S.^****, Makarov A. A.^*****

Bauman Moscow State Technical University, MSTU, 5, bldg. 1, 2-nd Baumanskaya str., Moscow, 105005, Russia

*e-mail: vevladi@mail.ru
**e-mail: duh@bmstu.ru
***e-mail: karas-dimitrov@mail.ru
****e-mail: is.krutov@mail.ru
*****e-mail: Makarov_bmstu@mail.ru

Abstract

The accidents of two Earth satellites collision when impact velocity of the spacecraft abeam reached 10.5 km/s. This velocity is several times than that required for a crystal lattice inertial explosion of the metal, constituting the spacecraft body. Inertial explosion parameters of metal components, which can occur at the contact point of the collided spacecraft, are studied. The paper demonstrates experimental and computed data on the collision velocity, causing such an explosion, as well as motion speed and explosion vaporous products temperature, reaching 22 000 K. It shows that the time necessary for metal transition from the solid state to luminous atomic-vaporous mixture reaction excitation does not exceed 2 µs, if this transition was caused by mechanical shock. Mass ratio of the exploded metal was determined. All experiments were conducted using lead samples.

Metal preserves its solid state until the metallic binding energy  is enough to preserve its crystal lattice. This energy equals to the sum of a metal heat content from the temperature T = 0 K plus evaporation heat up to the sample sublimation. Acquiring the energy of  the metal ceases to be a condensed media and passes to high temperature vapor condition. Such transition occurs while siderite or nickel meteorite collision with Earth, or spacecraft.

The experiment procedure was as follows. The lead ram tester of a cylindrical form weighted 0.027 kg, had the diameter of 14.5 mm and length of 15.2 mm. Its velocity was v = 1128 + 14 m/s. The lead target was of a parallelepiped shape of 67 × 82 × 15.5 mm and weighted 0.91 kg. The target mass remained after the lead ram tester stroke was 0.68 kg. The rest lead target mass (as well as the ram tester) evaporated.

During the experiment, the velocity of moving elements was determined by images movement on video frames, recorded by Phantom V 16 model 10 video camera. The exposure time per one frame was 1 / 156000 s^-1, and the shooting speed was 25 000 frames per second.

The shock waves pattern in inertial explosion vaporous products of the two lead structures was obtained. The Mach number measured in the open air equals 2.36.

Keywords:

collision of spacecraft, metal inertial explosion, explosion products temperature, metal-to-vapor transition time

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