A velocity interferometer technique to determine shear-wave particle velocity in shock-loaded solids

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Abstract
An optical technique is described which uses velocity interferometers to determine the large particle velocity changes associated with plane shear‐wave propagation. In this technique two velocity interferometers are used to monitor different diffracted laser beams from a surface which undergoes both longitudinal and shear motion. Fringes produced in the interferometer are proportional to a linear combination of both the longitudinal and shear components of the free‐surface velocity. The technique has been used successfully to monitor the free‐surface velocity of a Y‐cut quartz specimen impacted by an X‐cut quartz plate. Although the present shear‐wave velocity profiles are limited to an accuracy of ±10%, the accuracy can be easily increased by an order of magnitude by using longer delay legs and larger diffraction angles.