Mitigation of Acceleration of Vehicles Subjected to Buried Mine Loading

This dissertation investigates the mitigation of acceleration to passengers on a blast loaded vehicle. Small scale explosive testing was conducted to simulate the detonation of a buried mine on a vehicle. Tests were conducted in saturated sand, which will act as the loading mechanism on the simulated vehicle. Piezoelectric accelerometers, in conjunction with high speed cameras, were used to record test data. Two forms of mitigation were utilized in this research: hull shaping and crushing polyurea-coated thin-walled cylinders. Hull shaping deflects the blast, while the polyurea-coated thin-walled cylinders are crushed to absorb energy. Both forms of mitigation were tested, both separately and together, to determine their effectiveness at mitigating acceleration on the simulated vehicle. The goal of this dissertation is to determine the effectiveness of different mitigation techniques at reducing acceleration in order to design safer military vehicles