
424 Ballistics: Theory and Design of Guns and Ammunition
A jump as described in the previous paragraph will take place through the formation
of a shock wave and proceed along what is called a Rayleigh line. The equation of the
Rayleigh line is derived by a combination of the mass and momentum equations and, for
convenience, setting u
0
= 0. This results in
pp
U
U
v
10
2
=
2
2
1
(16.23)
The slope of the Rayleigh line is then
slope=
2
0
2
U
U
2
2
=
ρ
(16.24)
Recall from thermodynamics that the area under a p–v diagram represents the work done
on or by the system. Then if we shock a system up a Rayleigh line and allow it to relax
along the Hugoniot, the net ...