Abstract
The effect of the ignition delay time gap is newly studied. The operational characteristics of the linked two pyrotechnic thrusters are affected by the time gap. Although two thrusters are simultaneously ignited, the time at which the pressure starts to rise in each thruster may not be synchronized. The characteristic of the system with the time gap is compared with that of the fully synchronized system without any time gap. Depending upon the magnitude of the time gap, the pressure-time profile and the ballistic performance are different. When two pyrotechnic thrusters have a time gap, the peak pressure of one thruster(in which the pressure is built up earlier) is increased and the other is decreased. As the time gap is increased, the peak pressure is converged into the maximum pressure. This maximum pressure can be obtained when only one thruster is activated. Because the maximum pressure is bounded, it is predicted that there isn't any catastrophic failures in the considered system. When the time gap is relatively small, the impulse of the combined force acting on the moving body is almost maintained. But the ballistic performance of the system with a large time gap should be carefully estimated because the reduction of the ballistic performance should not be easily neglected.
