Resistance of a concrete target to penetration of a rigid projectile - revisited

Attention is given to the comprehensive description of target resistance via the equation of state and the failure envelope; this material behavior presentation is common in computational models, and is also adopted, although in a very simplified form, in analytical models. However, it will be shown that these advanced models are also commonly identified through the unconfined strength, and therefore they poorly describe the specific characteristics of the material under discussion. There is a need to produce refined data for the equation of state and of the failure envelope that are related to the concrete mix characteristics. Recently a new wide scope testing program has been initiated at our laboratory to achieve that goal, and early results have already been produced.