More on the penetration of yawed rods

One of the most complex processes, in the field of terminal ballistics, is that of yawed impact of long rods. In spite of many experimental observations, and some analytical modeling, a clear picture of this issue is still lacking. In order to gain some insight into the operating mechanisms, we developed a simple engineering model which considers the yawed rod as a series of small disks. We then define the effective length and diameter of the rod by considering those disks which are going to hit the initial crater which is opened by the impact. We also performed a series of 3D numerical simulations with various L/D tungsten alloy rods impacting a steel target, at yaws in the full range of 0-$90^\circ$. We analyzed the results of these simulations in terms of the normalized penetration (P/D), where D is the rod diameter, and looked for systematic trends in the results for the various rods. The agreement between our model predictions and both experimental data and simulation results is quite good. Based on this agreement we can highlight some new features of the penetration process of yawed rods