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Modern Body Armour


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I was sent this via email and I'm impressed enough to share it...

It's a game changer in one way but highly unlikely the target would weather the blunt force injury.

Edited by ChrisJones
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Wouldn't like to see someones ribs after that,reminds me of the guy who asked his girlfriend to shoot him with a .50 pistol while he was holding a bible? and filmed it for his blog or youtube.

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It said no titanium etc. Just very dense polyethylene.

That said, I think the .50 BMG would still kill you. That level of transference of energy would most likely be sufficient to rupture a major artery to the heart or similar. Remember the manikin is hard plastic not soft tissue and it suffered considerable deformation.

I've seen this stuff before but never with a .50 cal. With that type of performance and only 4lbs, this has to be a candidate for military use as you could all but make troops impregnable to anything other than a headshot. That said, without export restrictions / classification, all sides are going to have this. Wonder if we're about to see a switch in warfare to armour piercing rounds as standard?

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1 minute ago, Alsone said:

It said no titanium etc. Just very dense polyethylene.

That said, I think the .50 BMG would still kill you. That level of transference of energy would most likely be sufficient to rupture a major artery to the heart or similar. Remember the manikin is hard plastic not soft tissue and it suffered considerable deformation.

My point exactly. IF it was backed with a more rigid laminate layer it might improve it. I didn't say it was backed with titanium, I speculated about it being.

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I think it likely there would be some fairly serious internal trauma from the shock of that caliber, who knows if it would be survivable, whatever, you would have more chance wearing it than not I suspect.

Just the same, this is an EXTREME test, and the majority of people in field conflict are not hit by a .5.

Against a conventional  5.56 or 7.62 I rather suspect this would be VERY effective!

:thumbs:

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54 minutes ago, Alsone said:

It said no titanium etc. Just very dense polyethylene.

That said, I think the .50 BMG would still kill you. That level of transference of energy would most likely be sufficient to rupture a major artery to the heart or similar. Remember the manikin is hard plastic not soft tissue and it suffered considerable deformation.

I've seen this stuff before but never with a .50 cal. With that type of performance and only 4lbs, this has to be a candidate for military use as you could all but make troops impregnable to anything other than a headshot. That said, without export restrictions / classification, all sides are going to have this. Wonder if we're about to see a switch in warfare to armour piercing rounds as standard?

Just as long as our guys have it and the enemy doesn’t......happy days !!!

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On 18/07/2018 at 11:16, shovel leaner said:

Just as long as our guys have it and the enemy doesn’t......happy days !!!

I agree but without export restrictions, you can bet your bottom dollar, the Russians have already bought some.

What US forces really need to adopt is Tracking Point. However, I imagine price is the issue.

Can you imagine forces with this body armour and tracking point rifles, even if it was only squad marksman?
 

 

 

Edited by Alsone
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3 minutes ago, Alsone said:

I agree but without export restrictions, you can bet your bottom dollar, the Russians have already bought some.

 

 

Anyone that can afford to manufacture it will be utilising it. I'm curious as to cost and availability though. While it's striking to watch it as a ballistic plate I'm thinking more along the application to armoured vehicles.

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On 18/07/2018 at 09:11, Born Hunter said:

I wonder if it was backed with titanium, carbon fibre or similar if it'd spread the force better reducing the pressure? It's clearly very good at containing a projectile.

I saw something like this on "How do they do that?" on telly the other day.  The armour looked similar to this one, but the front had some weird kind of ceramic that shattered on impact, but could take repeated shots without letting a bullet through.

On that one though, the dummy was made of plasticine instead of hard plastic and it had a pretty good fist-sized dent in it after one shot and I think that was 7.62 round. Definitely not a 50. 

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1 minute ago, ChrisJones said:

Anyone that can afford to manufacture it will be utilising it. I'm curious as to cost and availability though. While it's striking to watch it as a ballistic plate I'm thinking more along the application to armoured vehicles.

Could be but Active Protection Systems are now all the rage. One issue with using polyethylene as tank armour is many rounds detonate in proximity and use a jet of plasma and molten metal to melt their way through the armour rather than use direct energy to blast their way through. Polyethylene is not famed for heat resistance. Ceramics are often used in armour these days eg Chobham armour or active protection plates which seek to neutralise the incoming threat with an outwards explosion of their own.

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5 minutes ago, Alsone said:

Could be but Active Protection Systems are now all the rage. One issue with using polyethylene as tank armour is many rounds detonate in proximity and use a jet of plasma and molten metal to melt their way through the armour rather than use direct energy to blast their way through. Polyethylene is not famed for heat resistance. Ceramics are often used in armour these days eg Chobham armour or active protection plates which seek to neutralise the incoming threat with an outwards explosion of their own.

True but I'm thinking more from the perspective of a civilian contractor. They tend to be heavy steel to keep down the costs but the weight of the vehicles are tremendous and it put additional strain on all the components, which have to uprated accordingly. By using something plastic based, like this,  in an environment where the aggressor is only using small arms, is a game changer.

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On 20/07/2018 at 00:20, ChrisJones said:

True but I'm thinking more from the perspective of a civilian contractor. They tend to be heavy steel to keep down the costs but the weight of the vehicles are tremendous and it put additional strain on all the components, which have to uprated accordingly. By using something plastic based, like this,  in an environment where the aggressor is only using small arms, is a game changer.

Where it could certainly make a difference is bullet proof limousines / cars for VIP / rich individual use. Currently armoured civilian cars put on several tons when armoured and need a whole host of other upgrades eg engine, suspension etc to cope with the weight, which is why armouring a car can cost in excess of 150K. To be able to put light panels simply behind the existing door panels, could make the whole armouring process much quicker and cheaper.

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