RESEARCH ARTICLE | JULY 20 2004

Shock Compression of Silicon Polymer Foams with a Range

of Initial Densities 
R. R. Alcon; D. L. Robbins; S. A. Sheffield; D. B. Stahl; J. N. Fritz

AIP Conference Proceedings 706, 651–654 (2004)

https://doi.org/10.1063/1.1780323

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AIP Conference Proceedings (July 2018)
 SHOCK COMPRESSION OF SILICON POLYMER
FOAMS WITH A RANGE OF INITIAL DENSITIES†
R. R. Alcon, D. L. Robbins, S. A. Sheffield, D. B. Stahl, and J. N. Fritz
Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM 87545
Abstract. We report here on a collection of shock compression experiments on a silicon polymer
foam with varying degrees of distension from low (~0.4 g/cm3) to the near fully dense material (~ 1
g/cm3). These experiments are being carried out on a two-stage gas-gun (50 mm bore) with a Kel-F 81
impactor at velocities between 1.5 and 3.1 km/s. Particle and shock velocity measurements are made
with magnetic gauges by inserting the gauge package (0.001 inches thick) between layers of 2.3 mm
thick foam. Special attention is required for assembly of these targets due to the foam’s low strength.
To minimize compression and gaps at interfaces, the foams are positioned between support rings,
which are machined to match the foam’s thickness. The Hugoniot data from these experiments is
compared to unpublished data obtained with explosively driven flyers at Los Alamos National
Laboratory in the early 1980’s.
INTRODUCTION These foams are not machinable, are very easily
compressed, and exhibit significant heterogeneity
Shock compression experiments require
with respect to void size for the lowest density
meticulous assembly and attention to detail. Target

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foams. Initial experiments have been successful,
materials typically require machining to tolerances
but demonstrate the subtle difficulties associated
of only a few ten thousandths of an inch. The
with avoiding gaps, while at the same time
smallest (a-priori insignificant) mistake will
minimizing initial compression. We chose to do
frequently result in a lost shot or, minimally, an
the initial experiments on the highest density foams
increase in the uncertainty of the data. Perhaps
to minimize these effects.
these unfortunate facts are part of the reason that
little shock compression data exists for foams. Embedded (sandwiched) “stirrup” type magnetic
Foams are in general difficult, if not impossible, to gauges are used here to obtain particle
machine and are sometimes even more difficult to velocity/time profiles at three depths in the target.
make geometrical measurements upon—especially Analysis of these wave profiles yields Hugoniot
for easily compressible, highly distended foams. data and also aids in assessing the quality of the
target assembly. The Hugoniot data are also
This paper focuses on some of the experimental
compared to unpublished data generated by Fritz
intricacies of shock compression gas-gun
[1] in the early ‘80s (Fig. 1). Fritz’ high-pressure
experiments on silicon foams comprised of foamed
data were acquired with explosively driven flyer
polydimethylsiloxanes (PDMS). The goal of this
plates and explosively driven shocks. The
work is to generate Hugoniot data and particle
pressures attainable with the two-stage gas gun
velocity-time wave profiles over a range of
used in this study will extend the existing Hugoniot
pressures for these silicon foams, which have
data to lower pressures and allow for some overlap.
varying degrees of distension, from ~ 0.4 to 1 g/cc.
In addition to the Hugoniot data the present study
An obvious prerequisite to this work is to develop
yields dynamic particle velocity wave profiles
the best procedures for assembling the foam targets.

†
Work performed under the auspices of the U.S. Dept. of Energy.

CP706, Shock Compression of Condensed Matter - 2003, edited by M. D. Furnish, Y. M. Gupta, and J. W. Forbes
© 2004 American Institute of Physics 0-7354-0181-0/04/$22.00
651

FIGURE 1. Unpublished Hugoniot data on a silicon
polymer foams obtained in the early 1980’s by Joseph
Fritz at Los Alamos National Laboratory.[1]
offering the possibility to learn more about the
foams crush-up process and reactions.
EXPERIMENTS
Material Description – The silicon foam
mixture supplied from Dow Corning contains a
proprietary mixture of PDMSs, cross-linkers, and
diatomaceous earth. Dow Corning’s trade name for
this foam precursor is S5370. The mixture is
foamed by addition of a tin catalyst. The foaming
and compression to final density was completed at
Los Alamos National Laboratory specifically for
these shock compression experiments. The foams
were made to four (nominal) densities, 0.4, 0.8, 0.9
and 1.0 g/cc. These densities were chosen to mimic
the foam densities used by Fritz [1] for comparison.
Each pressing was made to a thickness of ~ 2.5 mm
and diameter of 250 mm. Gas-gun target coupons
were punched from these pressings (Fig. 2). These
50 mm diameter by 2.5 mm thick disk were used as
cut in the target assembly, since no machining or
lapping was possible with the foam. The coupons
have a “skin” or smooth film on both sides, which
becomes more apparent for the highly distended
foams.
Technique -- Experiments were done on a 50-
mm-bore two-stage gas gun capable of launching
projectiles to velocities of 3.1 km/s. Kel-F 81
652
FIGURE 2. Silicon foam target discs were prepared
with initial densities ranging from 0.4 to 1.0 g/cc. These
foam discs are very flexible and compressible and were
not amenable to machining. Kel-F front, PMMA rings,
and silicon polymer foam discs are shown.
impactors were used on each of these experiments.
Stirrup type magnetic gauges were used to acquire
dynamic particle velocity-time profiles. The
implementation of magnetic gauges to shock
compression research has been recently reviewed
by Sheffield [2] and is not discussed here. The
stirrup gauge used for these measurements is shown
28 August 2023 07:15:35
in Fig. 3 and consists of a 5 µm thick aluminum
conductor sandwiched between two thin Teflon
sheets for a total thickness of 30 µm. There are
actually two gauges shown in Fig. 3. Since they lie
in the same plane they record similar velocities and
are both used on occasions for redundancy.
Target Assembly – A schematic of the sandwich
type target assembly is shown in Fig. 4. The
assembly consists of two foam targets sandwiched
between two target plates. The target plates were
used to add rigidity to the assembly, since the
foams are very flexible. The target plate at the
impact side is made of Kel-F 81 and is an
impedance match to the Kel-F 81 impactor. The
target plate on the opposite side is made of PMMA.
Clear PMMA windows were chosen to allow for
velocity interferometry measurements at the
foam/PMMA interface in subsequent experiments.
Also shown in Fig. 4 are two spacer rings. Rings
were machined and lapped to final thickness, which
were unique to each foam’s thickness. This is
necessary to prevent compression of the foam or
gap formation at the interfaces. Foam thickness

FIGURE 3. Stirrup type magnetic gauges used for these
experiments consist of a thin 5 µm aluminum foil
sandwiched between two Teflon sheets for a total thickness
of ~ 30 µm.
was measured at multiple locations on the foams 50
mm diameter with a height gauge. Two different
“foot” diameters were used with the gauge setup to
assess measurement error associated with
compression. It appears from work with foams near
1 g/cc that an optical based technique will be
required for the fully distended (0.4 g/cm3) foams.
Gauges were positioned at the three locations
shown in Fig. 4. To prevent adhesive from filling
the foam’s voids, the gauges were pulled taunt and
glued to the target plate and/or to the spacer rings,
depending on the gauges position.
DATA
Three shots have been completed on the two-
stage gas-gun each at a nominal projectile velocity
of 2.1 km/s. Three foam densities ranging from
0.82 to 1.0 g/cm3) were used in these initial shots.
Recorded particle velocity–time profiles for the
0.93 g/cm3 silicon foam target is shown in Fig. 5.
The first gauge shows an abrupt jump in velocity
and a fairly fast drop before stabilizing to a particle
velocity of 1.31 mm/µs. The early spike is
evidence of a gap between the first foam and the
Kel-F 81 target plate. The spike arises because of
the free surface associated with the gap. Gaps are
not surprising due to the variation in the foams
thickness across the disks diameter. The gauge
appears to return the correct velocity, since it agrees
well with the particle velocity recorded with the
second gauge. The particle velocity recorded with
653
Kel-F 81 Plate
PMMA
Keeper Rings
Impact Face
Stirrup Gauges
Silicon Foam
PMMA Window
FIGURE 4. Schematic of the sandwich type target
assembly used in these experiments. Rigid target plates
(Kel-F 81 and PMMA) were used to hold the foams in
place. Spacer rings machined from PMMA were
tailored to each foams thickness to help prevent
compression or gaps in the assembly. Three magnetic
gauges positioned as shown, allow the evolution of the
shock front to be viewed as a function of time.
the third gauge is lower due to the higher
impedance of the PMMA target plate.
Particle velocity for these shots was calculated
from the average of the first 0.5 µs of the first
gauge for each shot. The shock velocity was
28 August 2023 07:15:35
calculated by measuring the shock’s arrival time at
each gauge and linearly fitting to the gauge’s
position. Results for these first three shots are
given in Table 1. The only variable in these three
shots was the foam’s density. These data are
plotted along with a subset of Fritz’ data in Fig. 6.
The new data (circled in Fig. 6) fall just below the
lowest pressures achieved in Fritz’ experiments, but
show relatively good agreement. The two
Hugoniot points for the higher densities (0.93 and
1.01 g/cm3) overlap and are in line with Fritz higher
density Hugoniot data. The Hugoniot data point for
the 0.82 g/cc foam lies just above Fritz’ Hugoniot
data for the 0.789 g/cm3 foam.
CONCLUSIONS
Initial shock compression experiments have been
completed on silicon foams with densities of 0.82,
0.93, and 1.01 g/cm3. Special care was taken in the
design and construction of the silicon foam target
assemblies due to the flexible and easily
compressible nature of the foams. Hugoniot data
from these first experiments agrees with existing
FIGURE 5. Dynamic particle velocity wave profiles
from shot 2S-121. Data from the second set of gauges
have been shifted by 50 ns to distinguish it from the first
and show the agreement. The first waveform represents
the particle velocity at the Kel-F 81/foam interface. The
spike at the beginning indicates a gap was present at the FIGURE 6. Hugoniot data from the current work is
interface. The second set of profiles beginning just shown within the ellipse and agrees with earlier work by
before 1 µs represents the particle velocity between the Fritz on silicon foams.
two silicon foam discs. The third set shows the particle
velocity at the foam/PMMA interface.

explosively driven (high pressure) data [1]. In ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

addition to generating Hugoniot data, embedded

28 August 2023 07:15:35

magnetic gauges used in this work are yielding
dynamic particle velocity waveforms. No evidence
of reaction is seen on these initial low-pressure
shots, but the profiles do show rounding of the
shock front as it propagates through the first and
second foam discs. The waveforms also show
spikes in some of the data, which are evidence of
gaps in the target assembly. Analysis and modeling
efforts are ongoing and should help in
understanding the shock compression of foams.
Seth Gleiman and Tom Stephens supplied the
Dow Corning silicon foam mixtures and foamed the
samples to the desired densities.
REFERENCES
1. Unpublished data from experiments completed by
Joseph Fritz in the early 1980s at Los Alamos
National Laboratory.
2. Sheffield, S. A., Gustavsen, R. L., and Alcon, R. R.,
In-Situ Magnetic Gauging Technique used at
LANL-Method and Shock Information Obtained,”
in Shock Compression of Condensed Matter-1999,
Eds. M. D. Furnish, L. C. Chhabildas, and R. S.
Hisxon, AIP Conference Proceedings No 505 p
1043 (2000).

TABLE 1. Hugoniot data for initial silicon foam shock compression experiments
Shot # Impactor Impactor Silicon Shock Particle Pressure
Velocity Foam Velocity Velocity (GPa)
(mm/µs) Density (mm/µs) (mm/µs)
(g/cm3)
2S-113 Kel-F 81 2.02 1.01 3.22 1.29 4.19
2S-120 Kel-F 81 2.02 0.82 2.95 1.41 3.41
2S-121 Kel-F 81 2.01 0.93 3.21 1.31 3.91

654