Numerical Simulation of Damage Behavior for Submunition Payloads Subjected to Kinetic Kill Vehicle

To investigate the lethality of kinetic vehicle against chemical submunition tactical ballistic missile, numerical simulations were carried out with Autodyn Hydrocode. The influences of strike angle and impact point on the damage effect of submunition were analyzed. The results show that, the damage effect of simulated submunition payload was significantly influenced by the impact point and strike angle. The damage rate of submunition was improved obviously when the impact point at the geometric center or the interface of submunition tiers. The optimal range of strike angle is different for various impact points. The damage effect is better for the situation of small strike angle and the impact point at the front of submunition payload, for another situation is upright strike angle and the impact point at the middle part or tail end. All these works can be beneficial to lethality assessment, interception mode adoption and KV optimum design for negating ballistic missile in midcourse phase.