You’re driving down a rutted out wahdi in Helmand province. Your eyes are tired from the monotony, but you know you have to keep on your scan for those tell-tale spots of disturbed earth.
Rounding a small bend, you drive down a slight embankment and veer back to the right and BOOM! the IED goes off.
The proximity of your JLTV was close enough to the huge explosion (double stack 155 rounds) that your crew — if they had not been killed outright — would be left severely wounded, with possible brain injury from the cuncussive blast.
That is except for the innovative armor their high tech vehicle carried…
For more than a year, a good friend of mine has been developing with some key industry leaders in sensors, explosives and armor technology a new system designed to take the boom out of a bomb. I can’t get into the specific numbers for security and patent reasons, but the long and the short of it is that David Woroner of Survival Consultants International has designed a system that uses high-tech air bags to absorb the blast of a roadside bomb. The layers of ballistic material also help mitigate shrapnel, but the primary mission of the armor is to negate the overpressure that causes so many TBI casualties.
This project is still in the “paper” stages and has not been field tested yet, but a bevy of scientists and industry engineers are on the case running the numbers.
I have included here a video animation of the system to give you a better idea of how it works. While a lot has to be refined, the system offers the promise of a lightweight solution to a problem that the JLTV will likely face in the future.
And if the technology doesn’t work on the testing field, at least Dave’s idea could prompt some discussion of ballistic protection systems that don’t rely on heavy plates of armor or composits, but instead attack the problem from a very different angle.
– Christian
{ 24 comments… read them below or add one }
The problem with this is the problem with any one-time use defensive system. What if someone figures out a way to trigger it without an explosion. One of our enemies could design a flare that sets off the system. Sells (or even just gives) that flare to insurgents. Insurgents set up IED so that the flare triggers a second or two before the explosion. Not enough time for a driver to react. Enough time for the air bag system to deploy and be rendered mostly useless when the real explosion goes off.
Chuck…that issue is covered in the video. I think this is a helluva idea…heck even if it can be spoofed just layer the system so it can be deployed multiple times. I like it.
Light might be faster than a shockwave, but that wave is coming in at mach 10, which means the bags have to come out at say mach 3 or faster.
The bags will way several kilos, several kilos to mach 3 then to zero is not a trivial engineering problem.
But good luck.
adw, this is like reactive armor, the airbags essentially explode outward as the blast wave comes in, disrupting it.
the system to trigger it is going to be able to be configured to not deploy against decoys, but it depends on how difficult it is to mimic the light of an explosion and how characteristic the light of an ied is. if the system has to be broad to ensure that it deploys against all IEDs it will be easy to fool, whereas if explosion light has a more particular signature, the system would only deploy against that, and would be harder to fool. Governments could make devices to trigger it, but terrorist bomb shops? I doubt it. Besides, the system could be updated to ignore certain countermeasures.
Besides, vulnerability to an IED is a fleeting moment, causing the system to trigger immediately before the explosion doesnt really defeat the system, only helps it.
It is a good idea, but whether it is worth integrating depends on cost and effectiveness.
This might have battlefield potential too as part of an ADS, imagine if you could use airbags to counter RPGs? It would be MUCH lighter than using slat armor.
As configured, it’s configured to respond to a blast. Trying to imagine something that detonates on impact, as opposed to a blast from an IED. Response time drops precipitously, would it not?
How does this work against shaped charges and EFPs, in it’s present configuration?
Also, would the airbags incapacitate the crew and prevent them from responding? So you survive the explosion. Now half of the side facing the enemy is covered in bags and the ambush with small arms fire begins.
Would it be better for the airbags to be “launched” in the direction of the explosion, as opposed to being stuck on the side of the vehicle? Or too much of an engineering hassle for too little payoff?
Would you rather be riding through Indian Territory with or without this type of armour?
Damn good job if you succeed we need a system like this as much as any new armor specialy for lighter vehicles.
The problem is response time not the defense so ,for now dont even bother thinking how it could be fooled,airbags of any type will be pyrotechnical trigered so you have a delayed exposion + complete inflation , trying to match a preceding Ied explosion only step away, would have very hard time deploying on time without even considering procesing the information.
One thing with this most problematic with Ied’s is the public perception that it should always be survivable with an Mrap type truck,fact is nothing can withstand big enough expolsive ,in libanon israelis lost a couple super heavy 70-80ton ambush protected Merkavas it just took a biger bomb in this case a mine on top of a 500lb bomb
Something like this is already in existence. Check out the TRAPS system for the M1 Abrams tanks and other systems – Tactical Rocket Propelled Active Protection System. Uses airbags to intercept and neutralize RPGs.
1. Easily spoofed. A half-block of C4 has the same “specificty of light spectrum” (do they not have an editor?) as 1000 lbs of C4.
2. Protective mechanism not clear. Does it bounce the shock wave off the vehicle? Absorb it? Reflect it? The whole vehicle or just the part covered by bags? Does it make roll-overs more likely? Is there any evidence that this would actually do anything besides cover the side of your vehicle with shredded bags? The Tron-like blast wave animation at the end provided zero useful information.
Not every new idea is a good idea. Sometimes an idea hasn’t been used before because it isn’t a good idea. Dragon Skin, anyone? Non-shaped charge IEDs are brute force attacks, and a brute-force (heavy armor) response is still the best, cheapest, most reliable thing going (and more brute force explosive will always be the cheapest, most reliable way to beat armor). Makes your vehicle heavy and harder to deploy, but there isn’t really a lot of evidence out there that being super-light and super-fast to deploy is really all that great, so…
Good luck to them. Hope their tests work. But don’t buy stock in the company just yet.
Nope. This one won’t work. Like TDS said, a half pound of C-4, which wouldn’t be hard to rig up if you were about to detonate 1000lbs up the road, would easily set it off. Chances are that this “reactive armor” will do exactly what a car airbag will do, and render the vehicle useless. So with minimum effort on the part of the enemy, 5 troops in a truck are now 5 troops sitting in a no-visibility bullet magnet with no way to fight back unless they retreat from cover.
The brute force principle with masive steel armor can only protect against very limited IED ,and if its a shaped charge even less so shaped charges like on RPG can cut 2 feet thick steel armor its hard for an 1/2-3/4in armor to defeat it on its own.I suppose these bags would be some kind of multy layer design with porous material having lots of surface area in its layers as only real way to mitigate explosion is to put as much expendable material between the blast and the vehicle as you can to burn up at least part of the energy.
I suppose airbags would provide standoff against shaped charges. But against EFPs?
would be hard presed to give any protection against shaped charge(EFP is the product of shaped charge),as these are standoff shaped charges that in oposition to RPG dont make contact with armor so are much bigger to be enywhere near effective as ane RPG.It would be more efective against a simple blast ,as you destroj something energy us used destroying it so you have to have as much meterial to destroy ,sort of in a same way that active water sprinklers help with water droplets that absorb much of the explosive energy inside a building.
I think its not very far away before IRON MAN becomes a possibility. The amount of technology we see these days is making war more and more one sided. The technology should be safeguarded first so that it doesn’t fall in wrong hands.
Normal airbags in cars are already expensive, and the are ubiquitious. This anti explosion, faster than light anti blast airbag cost will be astronomical. Compare this to standard armour on vehicles in cost.
All this is nothing but some senator/general and greedy corporations idea to waste taxpayers dollars. Its ludicrous.
Good Evening Folks. I must admit I always I learn from your posts and would never dismiss or put them down. Ive learned better.
May I offer some “clarity” to this post? First, I hope it makes you think. If it does, than its all good. ok? :)
Heres the thing folks, Im only showing you a little tiny piece of the final product. It I showed you the “final,” you may see it differently. The bags are a consideration, and I know how to make them properly with certain wave killing other components.
Im surprised I don’t see more written about the “sensing components” of the system, rather than the “stick out armor?” Without detection of proper assignment, it won’t work you see? So, give that a little thought. I only am writing this because I belive so much “in the people, to teach me as well, people Ive never even met.” I am wide open, and appreciate your continued comments.
May I throw in a little “Hot Sauce” to spice things up? If the system is designed to handle handle overpressure waves (calculated at lets just say, “over 20K FPS,” < would it not make a little logic to expect something (an EFP, moving at a max V of 4K FPS to easily be handled?) The reason I am “chiming in” is I wanna get more feedback, I don’t claim to be george genious, just a guy with an idea. But an EFP is much slower, (which it is ) then lets stay focused on the “blast over, under, over pressures….You are mostly made of “water”, yes, blood is water, basically. So, what about lungs? and any other air spaces? Just some food for thought ok? Thank you for your time and patience with me. I know Im, umm…… lets just say not the “easiet guy to figure out.” I got a note tonite from a company asking me if I had a “learning disability?
I answered them…….. I said of course I do! I got my diploma, pissed on it and asked em if they liked the smell…… :)
“f*ck peace!”
An American Bad Ass, Outcomm…….
I’ve got a much better idea than armor, and I’m not kidding. Force fields are what we really need.
I realize the tech isn’t there yet, but it is as inevitable as the sun rising tomorrow morning; it will happen someday. Let’s hope it happens sooner rather than later.
It probably wouldn’t help against an EFP anymore than reactive armor helps against depleted uranium sabot loads out of a 120mm smooth bore. However, against a standard IED or an RPG/shaped charge warhead, it MIGHT work…the question is how well.
I say get it operational, and then give it to the Marines to test to destruction. If you can’t acceptably Marine proof it, scrap it, otherwise, its another tool in the box that might save lives.
Hmmmm creative at least and like reactive armor is probibily going to be only a one shot deal, but its worth further study.
I can see how the system might be gamed with flares or a two stage charge. This might be a real challenge for the programmers.
What fun a haji could have setting off airbags with flares… a laugh a second particulary if you put the real IED around the next corner…
I am all for inivative thinkers & thinking.
It is ideas like this that pave the way for next gen logistics. Yeah there are challengs ahead;lets face it this is not ABC, 123. But that does not mean it can’t or souldn’t be done.
I am all for inivative thinkers & thinking.
It is ideas like this that pave the way for next gen logistics. Yeah there are challengs ahead;lets face it this is not ABC, 123. But that does not mean it can’t or souldn’t be done.
Good Morning Ladies and Gents, Time for me to "chime in" a little again.
There are the bag components which are admittedly a challenge engineering wise to get out and in place in time. However, we have discovered an energetic that I can only say is "faster" than any conventional 29K FPS. This new energetic would do two things, assist in rapid deployment. But heres the catch and I can't get to far into how it works, suffice it to say theres another secret component that has not been, nor will it be shown in public…….
Best, David Woroner, SCI
check out iron man 2 on-line at http://movies.neverseen.net