A Novel Technique for Dynamic Analysis of an Electromagnetic Rail Launcher using FEM Coupled with Simplorer

Authors

  • J. Lydia Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Easwari Engineering College, Chennai 600089, India
  • R. Karpagam Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Easwari Engineering College, Chennai 600089, India
  • R. Murugan Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, St. Peter’s College of Engineering and Technology, Chennai 600054, India

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.13052/2022.ACES.J.370212

Keywords:

Current density, Inductance gradient of rails, ANSYS coupled with Simplorer (ACS), Pulsed power supply system

Abstract

The performance of a rail gun depends on the current density distribution over the rail and armature as it determines the force that accelerates the projectile of the rail gun. A finite element method (FEM) coupled with Simplorer was developed to model and study the performance of the rail gun. The rail gun was modeled using an ANSYS eddy current field solver to determine the current density distribution and equivalent rail gun circuit for the given rail gun geometry. The armature velocity was then calculated using Simplorer by coupling the obtained equivalent rail gun circuit and exciting the rails using a capacitor-based pulsed power supply (PPS) system. The FEM coupled with Simplorer method was verified by numerical calculations for the rectangular rails and also with other researchers’ value, and that showed a good agreement between the results. Further, the current density distribution over rails and armature and velocity of the armature was calculated for different rail cross sections such as circular concave, circular convex, rectangular concave, rectangular convex, T-shaped concave, and T-shaped convex with a C-shaped armature. It was observed that the circular convex rail gun with C-shaped armature showed minimum current density distribution and gives a higher value of armature velocity compared with other rail gun structures. Thus, the circular convex armature was found to be suitable for the electromagnetic (EM) rail gun launchingsystem.

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Author Biographies

J. Lydia, Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Easwari Engineering College, Chennai 600089, India

J. Lydia is currently a Research Scholar, pursuing her Ph.D. degree under the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Anna University, Chennai, India. She received the B.E. degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Easwari Engineering College, Chennai, India. She received the M.E. degree in Power Electronics and Drives from the Karunya Institute of Technology and Sciences, Deemed University, in 2006.

She is currently an Assistant Professor with the Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Easwari Engineering College and works in the fields of Electromagnetic Fields and High-Voltage Engineering. She is a member of ACES and MISTE.

R. Karpagam , Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Easwari Engineering College, Chennai 600089, India

R. Karpagam received the Ph.D. degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, Chennai, India, in 2013.

She is currently an Associate Professor with the Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Easwari Engineering College, Chennai, India. Her research interests include Partial Discharge Studies, Space Charge Measurements in Epoxy Nanocomposites, and Power Electronics. She is a member of ACES and IET.

R. Murugan, Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, St. Peter’s College of Engineering and Technology, Chennai 600054, India

R. Murugan received the bachelor’s degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from the University of Madras, Chennai, India, in April 1996. He received the master’s degree in High-Voltage Engineering from the College of Engineering, Anna University, Guindy, Chennai, India, in February 1999 and the Ph.D. degree from the Electrical and Electronics Engineering Department, Anna University in 2011.

His main areas of research interest are Electromagnetic Field and High-Voltage Engineering.

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Published

2022-07-09

How to Cite

[1]
J. . Lydia, R. . Karpagam, and R. . Murugan, “A Novel Technique for Dynamic Analysis of an Electromagnetic Rail Launcher using FEM Coupled with Simplorer”, ACES Journal, vol. 37, no. 02, pp. 229–237, Jul. 2022.

Issue

2022: Vol 37 Iss 2

Section

Articles