Selecting high velocity impact techniques

High velocity microparticle impacts are used to learn about the behavior of material under dynamic conditions and have applications in many fields, including space exploration and additive manufacturing. Veysset et al. describe the range of available experimental techniques for high-velocity impact testing. They hope their overview will serve as a reference for researchers designing high impact experiments and help guide them to the correct technique based on impactor size, geometry and velocity.

The authors are the original developers of laser-induced particle impact test (LIPIT), and they offered more detail about this technique, which is used to investigate single particle impacts in the high-velocity regime.

“About a decade after our first experiments, we gathered to reflect back on the research accomplishments using this technique,” said author David Veysset. “The field is now quickly expanding with LIPIT setups being built all around the world.”

They discuss recent studies featuring LIPIT to demonstrate the versatility of this method, as well as outline its potential applications, such as projectile penetration, impact protection, erosion, and additive manufacturing.

The authors believe LIPIT could be used to address new areas of physics. They would like their review to encourage further interest in LIPIT, so other researchers will continue to build on this technique.

“Our review shows experimental techniques are continuously improving, and experimental gaps still exist in microparticle impact regimes,” Veysset said. “Combinations of projectiles and targets are endless and fully open to the creativity of researchers.”

Source: “High-velocity micro-projectile impact testing,” by David Veysset, Jae-Hwang Lee, Mostafa Hassani, Steven E. Kooi, Edwin L. Thomas, and Keith A. Nelson, Applied Physics Review (2021). The article can be accessed at https://aip.scitation.org/doi/full/10.1063/5.0040772 .