Influences of Projectile Nose Shape on the Normal Perforation of Steel Plates by Rigid Projectiles

Numerical simulations were carried out to study the perforation of 12 mm thick Weldox 460E steel targets subjected to impact by 20 mm diameter rigid projectiles.Assuming the same mass, the cone angle of the conical-nosed projectile varied ranging from 10° to 180° and the caliber radius head of the ogive-nosed projectile varied from 0.5 to 4.0.The analysis was focused on the influence of the projectile nose shape on the ballistic limit and the failure mechanism, with the effect of the friction between the projectile and the target also taken into consideration.The results show that the cone angle of the conical-nosed projectile exerts significant effect on the ballistic limit.An increase in the projectile cone angle changes the failure mechanism of the target from ductile hole enlargement to shearing plugging.The caliber radius head of the ogive-nosed projectile exerts significant effect on the ballistic limit for ψ≥3.0, and the plate is perforated through the ductile hole enlargement mechanism with ψ≥1.0.The influence of the friction increases with the increase of the sharpness of the projectile nose.