On the hunt for a self-guided bullet

A tiny light-emitting diode attached to a self-guided bullet at Sandia National Laboratories shows a bright path during a nighttime field test that proved the battery and electronics could survive the bullet's launch. Photo courtesy of Sandia National Laboratories.

A couple of hunters who also happen to be engineers and researchers at Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, N.M., have patented a design for a self-guided bullet that could help troops in combat, according to a Sandia news release issued Jan. 30.

Sandia researchers Red Jones and Brian Kast, along with some of their colleagues, invented a dart-like, self-guided bullet for small-caliber, smooth-bore firearms that could hit laser-designated targets at distances of more than a mile, according to the lab, which is managed by the Sandia Corp., a wholly owned subsidiary of Lockheed Martin Corp., for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration.

The bullet has actuators that steer tiny fins that guide it to its target. Photo by Randy Montoya.

“We have a very promising technology to guide small projectiles that could be fully developed inexpensively and rapidly,” Jones said. Toward that end, Sandia is seeking a private partner to complete testing of the prototype.

A prototype built from commercially available parts so far has proven successful in tests, Jones said, though he noted that some engineering issues remain. “We’re confident in our science base, and we’re confident the engineering-technology base is there to solve the problems,” he added.

Sandia’s design for the 4"-long bullet includes an optical sensor in the nose to detect a laser beam on a target. The sensor sends information to guidance and control electronics that use an algorithm in an 8-bit central processing unit to command electromagnetic actuators. These actuators steer tiny fins that guide the bullet to the target, according to the news release.

The whole idea for the self-guided bullet began with a discussion about hunting between the two engineers.