Shek

A great intro on the subject in this thread, Dragon Skin Testing and the Truth - Professional Soldiers.

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"So little pains do the vulgar take in the investigation of truth, accepting readily the first story that comes to hand." Thucydides 1.20.3

leib10

Nice article. From the looks of it DS might not be the wonder armor everybody seems to think it is.

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"The right man in the wrong place can make all the difference in the world. So wake up, Mr. Freeman. Wake up and smell the ashes." G-Man

glow

I dunno when they had it on futureweapons it looked to hold up pretty damn good vs. what one guy says on a forum.

Bluesman

TV show.

Professional eval for life-and-death performance.

Easy call.

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"The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it, and if one finds the prospect of a long war intolerable, it is natural to disbelieve in the possibility of victory."
- George Orwell

Swift Sword

Gents,

The heaviest armor I have had occassion to wear was Level IIA so I am not personally familiar with the products in question.

However, in a past life, I was involved in the development and testing of armor panels for a minute or two.

IIRC:

1. .30 M2 is a difficult threat to defeat and I am not suprised when I hear it penetrates someting. We recovered M2 penetrators from sandbags behind the test fixture. After going through 1/2 inch rolled plate, the pentetrators were devoid of any copper or lead, completely unblemished and looked as if they might be ready to go if plopped onto a charged .243 case.

2. Not all 7.62 x 54R is created equally.

To address some variances in test results, we popped a few rounds from a few lots from a few vendors apart and sectioned the projectiles on one of the mills, shot them over a chron, etc. Some of them were harder than others and some of them were loaded hotter than others...MUCH hotter.

This may explain why armor that past one review might have failed another.

3. Barrel pitch seemed to have a material effect on penetration.

4. In general, there are a lot of fun and games in armor development, testing, certification and selection.

Bluesman is spot on regarding side panels. It is amazing, at least in my own researches on the civvy/law enforcement side, how many people have been maimed or killed by bullets that most likely would have been stopped by side panels.

Slightly OT, but I have seen what might have been the best armor yet floated. Unfortunately, I beleive I am still bound by non disclosure. However, the one hint we were allowed to give at the time was that the secret involved neolithic technology .

I would have thought the guy who coughed it up would have given it another crack given the emphasis on armor in the last couple of years. However, I cannot blame him for not trying: the Army would not even acknowledge his proposal for HUMVEE armor that was significantly lighter than the issue offering and has some features that should have, based on lab testing, made it more effective (see point #4 above).

The USN now pays K. handsomely to work on his tan in Kuiwait which is certainly a much better job than wrestling with Army procurement. Alas, bueracrats win and the Republic loses.

Have a good weekend,

William

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Pharoh was pimp but now he is dead. What are you going to do today?

Bluesman

PV2 Blueskid reports to Ft Knox today.

This is IT.

TopHatter

Wow...how soon they grow up

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If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.
~John Quincy Adams

Bluesman

True dat, bro.

By this time, he's been welcomed into the US Army's loving arms.

TopHatter

I'll watch Full Metal Jacket again and think kind thoughts his way.




(For all of you who are wondering, yes I know that FMJ was about Parris Island )