A top designer of flexible body armor similar to the much-vaunted Dragon Skin says he has just tested a new type of ballistic material that is far harder than current plates and can defeat one of the most deadly armor piercing rounds in the world.
And it can do all this at the same weight as a standard Enhanced Small Arms Protective Plate, but in a more flexible and comfortable package, developer Allan Bain claims.
Bain, who body armor experts agree was a founding father — with Dragon Skin maker Murray Neal — of the so-called “scalar” armor concept, has developed a new way to forge the ceramic that goes into the bullet-blocking plates, giving it greater density and the ability to be bent into odd shapes.
“This is probably about as cutting edge as it gets,” Bain told Military.com during an October 15 phone interview about the new armor, “Skaalar Exoskin Gen 4+“. “An E-SAPI plate is an inch thick. Then you’ve got the vest This [SEG4+] is an inch thick with everything included.”
With the help of experts at Georgia Tech University, Bain produces his armored disks in an oven that reaches nearly 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit – nearly half the surface temperature of the sun – to make the ceramic stronger, smaller and without sacrificing weight.
SEG4+ body armor wraps around the wearer like Dragon Skin, weighs about 7.5 pounds per square foot of coverage — about the same as a standard-issue E-SAPI plate — but delivers far more protection with “gapless, seamless” coverage for high-powered armor piercing rounds.
The military’s current body armor system, with two rigid front and back pates and two side plates, leaves open areas with no defense against rifle rounds.
But don’t get your hopes up that SEG4+ will be on order anytime soon for troops.
Manufacturing costs is one reason. Army caution is another.
Bain said the armor is currently so expensive to make that only the most elite units would likely be able to afford it. Special Forces may order and use armor the regular Army doesn’t get, and is currently testing this to see of it’s something they want.
And officials with the Army’s Program Executive Office Soldier confirmed to Military.com that the service was putting its search for flexible armor on hold because it deemed the scalar technology too immature.
But don’t tell Bain his armor isn’t ready.
“At this point in time, if someone wanted 100 of these we could deliver them,” he said.
The best known scalar system, Dragon Skin, is manufactured by Fresno, Calif.-based Pinnacle Armor. However Dragon Skin has a shaky reputation within the Army – which does the majority of armor testing, design and procurement for the services – after Pinnacle’s feisty president, Murray Neal, launched a full-scale public relations war touting his vest’s superiority after ballistics tests conducted by the Army in May 2006 showed Dragon Skin failing basic ballistics and durability tests.
Neal’s public campaign got Congress got involved, with hearings on Capitol Hill to get to the bottom of the controversy. Lawmakers ordered the Army to do further tests and the service asked industry to submit samples of flexible systems and armor that could withstand rounds more powerful than the current E-SAPI plate.
The Army planned to test the armor concepts later that year but had to postpone the evaluation after manufacturers asked for more time to acquire the exotic materials and do more testing of their own.
PEO Soldier officials at Fort Belvoir, Va., said the service will begin testing in November on new E-SAPI and X-SAPI designs – more than a year after the Army had originally intended to shoot the experimental plates.
Officials also said the flexible-system test will not go ahead as planned because “an F-SAPI capability has not reached the level [of] technical maturity to protect Soldiers in combat,” PEO Soldier said in an email response to Military.com.
Bain was cagey about the specific design and shape of his armor components but said it makes heavy use of lightweight polymers such as Dyneema and Kevlar fabric to achieve its ballistic resistance capability. The super-hardened ceramic retains 100 percent of its density after manufacture, as compared to a standard plate with 93 percent density, he added.
“It’s still some type of a disk,” Bain said. “But we’ve made interlocks. We’ve eliminated weak spots. We’ve made it very difficult for a bullet to hit a flat surface.”
“Everything’s geared toward getting that bullet to hit a severe angle,” he added.
In September, Bain subjected his armor to ballistic tests with shots from a Swiss-made armor piercing round that is more powerful than the one specified by the Army for its X-SAPI capability (for security reasons Military.com has declined to name the specific round the Army wants to beat).
The round shattered the tile, penetrated nine layers of Kevlar but was largely stopped by the Dyneema backing.
“That’s a really good stop,” Bain said. “And that’s a phase-one tile. We’ve already redesigned it.”
With more support from industry, Bain thinks he can cut down on the cost of the vest – currently, each tile costs about $50 to make – and with continued design improvements, he might be able to shave off some weight.
But for now, the Exoskin Gen 4+ is reserved for special operations troops and other high-risk forces, though Bain feels he’s demonstrated that the technology is there for flexible armor that defeats the meanest threats.
“This is the kind of process that can lend itself to making the ‘Star Wars’ style armor with lots of different segmented shapes,” Bain said. “It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to see what you can do with that.”
– Christian
- BTW that swiss made “miracle” is nothing else than good old SWISS P tungsten-core made by RUAG. Not much of killer compared to subcaliber hypersonic kinetic penetrator.
- Sure, right now, I have definitely killed hundreds of US soldiers by mentioning this cause now terrorist R aware of this ammo (they so stupid they cant use internet and google, U knew that?) and its not a problem to buy one of these top-class european AP ammo from swiss controlled (btw manufactured in germany) ammo company. Damn, dont U think U exaggerating this national security stuff, guys?
People often don’t know where to look or often the queries they need to get what they are seeking even if they know where to look. Its not just about terrorists in Iraq or Afghanistan, but also about criminals and other elements at home who don’t necessarily need to know the information or at the very least you don’t need to highlight it for them, Suncec. My question is why are you?
Suncec you really didn’t need to explain everything about that ammo. It’s one thing to point out it’s a known brand, it’s a whole nother thing to actually spell it out. Come on, why make it that easy if anyone was looking for it.
Don’t you think the Pinnacle indictment for defrauding the government might have just a tiny little to do with why Pinnacle has kind of shaky reputation? Neal’s willingness to falsely label armor as NIJ certified and sell it to USAF for use in a combat zone would make me kind of cautious about buying anything from him too. But those kind of facts would interfere with your narrative, now wouldn’t they?
Pinnacle so hyped Dragon Skin that the product should probably be described more as a hoax.
Having Neal associated with this new product leads me believe we are heading down the same road.
Suncec, I was just trying not to put anyone at undo risk. I’m happy to tell anyone via email what the round was and it is deemed to be more powerful, with better ballistics and penetrating capability, than the X-SAPI threat round…which I’m sure people know which that is too, but I’m still not going to say in an open forum.
I am no where near the ballistics expert Bain is, but when he says it’s a bad mofo and tests his armor with the XSAPI threat as well, I believe him.
Hey guys:
Couple of issues:
1) This have nothing to do with Murray Neal, it has been very painstaking to get this project to this point.
2) Same issues with Dragon Skin, heavier per square foot. The reason why we have hit a data point at such a low weight is because of materials and design.
3) The vest shown above is Multicam and also a prior generation design cover, the newer one is better.
Thanks for the interest.
ummm-”(for security reasons Military.com has declined to name the specific round the Army wants to beat)”.but in your previous article just before this one you said “Remember, the Army solicitation (which has been removed from their server but was described in a June 2007 posting) called for X-SAPI to defeat “future” AP threats — namely the M993 ”
so why make a fuss .
The DoD is always looking for better body armor, that includes protection levels, protection coverage area, weight, bulk, comfort, costs…etc. That may include level 4 and level 5 protection, that includes a new design/material or just a better trauma plate. E-SAPI and X-SAPI.
In the case of Skaaler, they claim to have a flexible vest than can be made for level 5 threats (which I assume means stopping Tungsten AP and .338) using TIC3 instead of the usual B4C, and a new forming process, that essentially merges XSAPI and OTV into one complete flexible system, around 30mm thick. Don’t know the overall weight, but if it is less than 30 pounds, for more coverage and protection, that would be awesome it is passed all the military tests.
One downside of integrated armor systems would be if level 5 weight is substantially more than level 3 and level 4 weights; then you would have to have multiple vests given the threat profile of a deployment. No need for level 5, or even level 4 weight, if you don’t have that threat.
The infamous Pinnacle claims a X-SAPI version of the now discredited Dragon Skin, but that thing looks as thick as a bomb disposal suit.
Kevin, I was unaware of any federal indictment of fraud made on Pinnacle. Do you have a link to anything on that?
The main issue always seemed to stem from inconsistencies in the scientific testing of Dragon Skin for better or worse if there were inconsistencies those should be addressed instead of taking what was proven as a flawed test as the final word.
Pinnacle should be punished if it knowingly defrauded the government and its behavior should be frowned upon, but consistency and fairness of the way things are graded is even more important than egos.
I think its great to see someone else working on flexible body armor and pushing the technological frontier a bit. Most vest are working with 20 year old tech that main improvements are just extra layers. I’m happy to see some good developments.
Ok, first off, it’s called the Georgia Institute of Technology. Besides there being a really long standing, bitter football rivalry with the (non-technical) University of Georgia in Athens, there is simply too wide a difference in the schools to allow a conflation of the names…
Second, the technology being developed through the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) is called hot cintering, I believe. A quick check of the GTRI newsletter will reveal many ONR-funded military programs…
Wondering if that swiss bullet is one of these:
http://www.dtic.mil/ndia/infantry/hug.pdf
Ppt produced by a Swiss company, study on various tungsten AP rounds.
You’re right, they are not under indictment yet, just apparently disbarred from USAF contracts and under federal investigation for fraud. Something about Pinnacle falsely claiming that their body armor was NIJ Level III certified (which it wasn’t) and verbally assuring USAF that it would stop certain level IV threats (which it didn’t). Fortunately nobody was killed due to this, but it seems to suggest something rather significant about the company and its products.
http://armedservices.house.gov/pdfs/FC060607/Thomas_Testimony060607.pdf
Have PD forces test armor, IE SWAT Units?
Army NG & Reserve forces on US Mex border.
BTW, what kind of price does “armor is currently so expensive” indicate? Are we talking $3000 or $30,000?
Hey guys, i was just wondering what exactly is the price going to be of this new armor? if someone could email me it would be much appreciated. Oh and is Dragonskin not worth time? Or is the new model actually delivering results?
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Dear CBA company,
Interesting photos, looks very experimental, fear not the prices are coming down! If you have a better material thats light and cheap to produce we are always looking for that!