Scored Elastomeric Grenade for Consistent Shrapnel
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional stingball grenades produce highly variable and potentially damaging shrapnel sizes and quantities, posing risks to eyes and soft tissues, necessitating a design that ensures consistent and safer fragmentation.
Innovation Solution
A rubber fragmentation grenade with a scored elastomeric outer layer forming rectangular segments, a cylindrical body, and a specific explosive charge configuration to ensure consistent shrapnel sizes of at least 16 mm×16 mm, minimizing injury risk.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Object-affected harmful factors
If conventional stingball grenades use two spheres of hard rubber with explosive charge, then non-lethal impact is achieved, but shrapnel size and quantity become highly variable and potentially damaging to eyes and soft tissue
Solution Approach 1:
The outer rubber sphere is pre-scored with radial cuts that divide it into multiple segments before detonation. These scores create predetermined fracture lines that guide the fragmentation pattern, ensuring that the rubber breaks into consistent-sized pieces rather than random shards. This segmentation approach directly controls shrapnel dimensions to prevent eye and soft tissue damage while maintaining the non-lethal impact function.
Solution Approach 2:
The rubber sphere is prepared in advance with pre-cut scores or grooves that define the future fragmentation pattern. These preliminary structural modifications ensure that when the explosive charge detonates, the rubber will break along the predetermined lines into uniform segments. This preliminary action eliminates the variability of random fragmentation and guarantees consistent shrapnel sizes that meet safety requirements.
2Object-affected harmful factors
If law enforcement agencies limit shrapnel size to no smaller than 16 mm×16 mm to reduce injury risk, then safety is improved, but the conventional grenade design cannot achieve consistent segmentation to meet this requirement
Solution Approach 1:
The outer rubber sphere is pre-scored with radial cuts that divide it into multiple segments before detonation. These scores create predetermined fracture lines that guide the fragmentation pattern, ensuring that the rubber breaks into consistent-sized pieces rather than random shards. This segmentation approach directly controls shrapnel dimensions to prevent eye and soft tissue damage while maintaining the non-lethal impact function.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention changes the structural parameters of the rubber sphere by introducing specific score patterns, depths, and spacing. These parameter modifications ensure that when detonation occurs, the rubber fragments into pieces that meet the minimum 16 mm×16 mm size requirement. By controlling the geometric parameters of the scores, consistent segmentation is achieved that satisfies both safety requirements and functional requirements.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The design results in a consistent and controlled fragmentation pattern, reducing the risk of eye and soft tissue damage while maintaining a non-lethal impact, enhancing safety in crowd control scenarios.
Implementation Method 1
a body containing an explosive charge, a fuse assembly connected to the body
Data Source
AI summary
A rubber fragmentation grenade has a body containing an explosive charge, a fuse assembly connected to the body, an elastomeric outer layer at least partly encompassing the body, and the outer layer being scored to provide a plurality of segments. The segments may be rectangular. Each segment may have a thickness, and may have a width greater than the thickness. The thickness may be at least one-third of the width. The body may include a cylindrical portion, and the outer layer may be a cylindrical sleeve encompassing the cylindrical portion. The segments may include a ring of segments. Each ring may include six segments. The explosive charge may be an elongated shape defining a charge axis and having opposed ends, the elastomeric outer layer being a cylindrical form being concentric with the charge. The elastomeric outer layer may extend beyond the ends of the charge.