Friday, March 13, 2015

New Body Armor to Lighten Soldier Load

Fielding body armor that is both protective and light has long been a challenge for the Army, but a new material that can reduce the weight of products by 30 percent is making its way into protective gear. The Army in December awarded a contract for the Generation II Soldier Plate Carrier System to Point Blank Enterprises. The new torso armor provides the same level of ballistic protection as the improved outer tactical vest, and it incorporates a product called Dyneema — a flexible, lightweight polymer fiber that is 15 percent stronger than steel.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is just "buy new stuff" in action. Dyneema is just a competitor for Kevlar, not a replacement and certainly not any real improvement. Any improvement in soldier body armor tech needs to come in the form of lighter, thinner plates that will still stop the Russian 7.62x54R AP round that the ESAPI plate was developed to counter. (The SAPI was not doing it)
Another potential improvement would be plate coverage/configuration, but lighter, thinner plates need to come first. Put the money that will be wasted on buying thousands of new units of body armor that is no real improvement into R&D.

Anonymous said...

Where is the incentive to RandD body armor effectiveness when ATF uses effectiveness of body armor as a means to ban private ammunition commerce? Plus, those pesky Citizens might want more effective better performing body armor and the loyalist pukes are still working on more body armor bans....