A Shotline Method for Modeling Projectile Geometry

Most vulnerability/lethality programs represent the path of a penetrator through a target by one-dimensional shotline. This approach is insufficient for projectiles with shoulder-fuzed contact or influence fuzes. It also fails to treat effectively discontinuities, obliquities, and small components found in typical targets. This report presents a modification of the shotline method in which the projectile is represented by a bundle of planetary rays disposed around the main ray. The program, MISFIR, computes effective standoffs for each cell. MISFIR will be critical in determining the lethality of warheads with modern fuze design. An applications program, FUZES, which treats issues concerning a hypothetical projectile, is also discussed. Source listings and sample output are provided in appendixes. The sample run illustrates the importance of considering the 3-D geometry of the projectile/target system. Keywords: Projectile trajectories; Projectile fuzes; GIFT computer program; Vulnerability analysis; Shotlining; Target description; COMGEON computer program; Warhead lethality and MISFIR.