A conceptual laser launch system of a spherical vehicle propelled by a doughnut-shaped laser beam is expected to accelerate the spherical vehicle continuously to the orbit velocity along a laser beam. Once lateral offset between the axis of the laser beam and the center of the sphere is generated, lateral force is generated to recede the offset. In this study, a pulsed Neodymium-doped Yttrium Aluminum Garnet laser beam of a doughnut-shaped cross section is focused on a 10-mm-diameter aluminum sphere. The impulse components, parallel and lateral to the laser beam, are first investigated experimentally using a pendulum method. As a result, the ratio of the doughnut beam radius R dn to the target radius R sp is found to have a major impact on the impulse. For a relatively small value of R dn / R sp at 0.56, at atmospheric pressure, the impulse is enhanced due to the focusing of the toroidal blast wave, whereas the shock focusing effect is negligible for a larger value of R dn / R sp at 0.86. On the other hand, R dn / R sp must be larger than 0.83 to generate the restoring lateral force.


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    Title :

    Impulse Generation and Stabilization Performance of a Doughnut–Spherical Laser Launch System


    Contributors:

    Published in:

    Publication date :

    2019-08-09


    Size :

    8 pages




    Type of media :

    Article (Journal)


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English




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