[Blackburn]

I'm curious about seeing what effect my handloads have in various calibers, and I'd like to get a bullet resistant vest that I could test against them. Something no one would want to keep and not worth anything, but which would still function reasonably well at it's job. (maybe stinky as hell and wearing away on the inside layer of the carrier?) The reason I ask this is for some confidence of my own that if I wear armor, that I know what it's limitations are, and for some general fun fooling around.

Any suggestions?

[lwsimon]

You can buy new stuff online, so I would assuem you could buy used, but it would be expensive. Perhaps try military surplus stores, or better yet, get teh name of a distributor, and ask them for any damaged vests.

[Blackburn]

Any more ideas?

[Joejojoba111]

Buy a commercialy available and cheap equivalent material, test commercial cartirdges of known performance, and compare to your hand loads. Kevlar is just string, woven into fabric, and the layers are held in place with a resin, probably vinylester. The absolute cheap man could use layers of canvas stuck together with rubber cement for a comparison. The man with more time and money can simply buy Kevlar fabric by the yard and a flexible resin compound. All that would matter is being consistent, as consistent as possible.

So you could test and say "well 10 layers of canvas in rubber cement is equal to 2 layers of kevlar fabric in resin" and work from there.

matweb.com

Peruse the plethora of persistent polymers:)

Buying a vest to test cartridges on the material is like buying a car door to test the corrosion resistance of the sheet metal.

I don't think any company would co-operate with you for testing their products, because the results would either appear negative or be meaningless when compared to NIJ comprehensiveness.

[grendelbane]

Kevlar panels salvaged from old vests often appear on E-Bay. Not as expensive as buying old vests.

Makes me wish I enjoyed sewing. :D

[nomadboi]

If you do end up getting some and playing with them, I might take 'em off your hands when you're done. I can use 'em for costume stuff for some of the films I work on.

Thanks,
-Kevin

[mbs357]

So I could make a vest with ten layers of canvas and save money?
Rock on.

[nomadboi]

If you're going for authentic medieval armor, then yes, canvas or linen ;)

For more modern protection, I'd reccomend Kevlar or something along those lines.
:D

[Joejojoba111]

Tensile strengths being what they are, I think synthetic materials would be more suitable, but hey it's all good:) There may come a point, around the 100th layer, when you realize a solid block of rubber cement alone would stop the bullets...

"Kevlar panels salvaged from old vests often appear on E-Bay. Not as expensive as buying old vests.
Makes me wish I enjoyed sewing."

See North Hollywood shoot-out... Sewing and handcraft skills must be regulated in the interests of officer safety.

"If you're going for authentic medieval armor, then yes, canvas or linen"

Raw silk is suitable armor material, extremely high tensile strength, used in Mongol kit, as well as WW1 British experimental armors.

[grendelbane]

Raw silk is suitable armor material, extremely high tensile strength, used in Mongol kit, as well as WW1 British experimental armors.

I knew that the US investigated silk body armor after the McKinley assassination, but dropped the idea because of the cost, and the fact that it was only effective against slow moving pistol bullets, and possibly shrapnel. High velocity jacketed pistol bullets became much more prevalent right away, and shrapnel was obsolete after the opening years of the Great War.

Wasn't Archduke Franz Ferdinand wearing silk armor when he was assassinated? Able to stop lead bullets fired at low velocities, but not able to stop even the .32 ACP mouse gun.

See, a little Kevlar in the right place, applied anachronistically, might have changed world history. :p

[grendelbane]

I know that this is thread hi-jacking, but can you give us some more description of the British silk armor?

[Kevlarman]

Yep, can't beat eBay for buying up old and stinky vests and accessories. I've bought 3 vests that were like new, and I wear them on ocassion for trips to the shooting range. I bought just one panel to stick in my backpack (for school), and other no name panel for shooting at. It's fun!

[Roadkill Coyote]

Its not hard to find someone selling used vests (http://www.bulletproofme.com/Bullet_proof_Vests_Catalog.shtml)

[The_Antibubba]

Don't know from personal experience, but I understand that many sails for racing yachts is kevlar. Maybe you can get some worn sails, or panels?

[Joejojoba111]

Kevlar fabric is sold openly everywhere, it's very useful stuff, they make canoes out of it. Think of it like they used to think of fibreglass (which co-incidentally would be almost as good but cheaper, e or s and so-on).

[GRB]

Blackburn,

You have me curious as to how you plan to test body armor. What is your plan besides shootingit? For instance, what will you use as backing for the vest when you do shoot it?
All the best,
Glenn B

[Blackburn]

I figure I'll get a plastic bucket and fill it with water (low cost weight) or rocks, and then duct-tape the armor to it.

I don't have any plans involving armor piercing ammo or anything sketchy like that, just thought it would be kind of neat to see what my rifles do to it and what a handgun can't do to it. I doubt I'll ever be actually shooting at someone wearing body armor unless I run accross a deja vu of the North Hollywood incident.

[GRB]

I don't know how well a bucket would work for that purpose. I have seen body armor placed over various hard surfaces such a metal reactive targets, plywood, plastic dummy, metal garbage can and so forth. When a bullet hit the armor it often went right through - even lower powered wad cutters sometimes did the trick. A vest was not designed to be worn over a hard surface that does not give like flesh and bone (yes your ribs and the sturnum give quite a bit under impact). A bucket will probably give quite a bit, so it may be better than some things I have seen tested but, don't fill it with water unless you want it emptied quickly. Chances are the first shot will at least crack the bucket. When soft body armor is hit, it pushes in at the point of impact, therefore the nice big bruises officers who get hit in the vest wind up having on their chests. Of course, being soft body armor it regains its shape quickly. Likewise the flesh under a vest, gets pushed in by the impact but rebounds nicely. A plastic water bucket will probably crack -but that is just my guess.

If you can affored it, a nice sized leg of lamb, or a big ham with bone in might be a decent backer for the vest. Also a big orange road cone (well not really a cone but, one of those orange barrel shaped things that they use in construction sites on the roads). They are plastic but they can take a beating and will go back to form. If you can find someone who has one, a range dummy, the type you shoot at would likely be great. I think they are made out of either soft rubber or dense foam material. They take hit aftet hit without blowing apart. A bale of hay might also work.

all the best,
Glenn B

[Blackburn]

Hm, a strawbale might work best. Yes, I'm fully aware of what backface deformation is- that's why if I do wear armor, it's gonna involve a trauma plate over places I don't want dents.

Thanks for the comprehensive info. :D

[thorn726]

wow that vest site had some interesitng stuff, vest on a plane, maybe- maybe not

"The prohibited and permitted items list is not intended to be all-inclusive and is updated as necessary. To ensure everyone's security the screener may determine that an item not on this chart is prohibited."

[sturmruger]

I just looked on Ebay under "kevlar" and found a whole bunch of differant auctions for used vests.

[Joejojoba111]

Yes, but you really don't get to see the selling prices. You can't search and see what items have been sold, and for how much (afaik). So you see the current prices, say $50<200, but that usually doubles or more in the last minutes. Plus the items are heavy and bulky so shipping costs are high. All-in-all probably not worth the effort, once it arrived I wouldn't have the heart to shoot it up, poor thing, just needs a good home.

Simon, lol remember when that would have been newsworthy? Lol, times sure do change.

"Ok people, your flights may be attacked by armed terrorists at any moment, maybe even NOW! Gotcha! As citizens during a war you must be prepared for any eventuality.or....NOW! You - you in the back, you didn't jump, that's suspicious, come with us. The rest of you, remember we are at level orange, so behave appropriately. Who owns the blue suitcase? Come out now one of you will talk eventually."
'i think that's mine'
"What's this? A ballistic panel? You planning something are you? Come with us."
'but you said I should be careful'
"Jeffery make a note the suspect was combative."
'no i'm not'
"There he goes again, use the taser old chap."

[G36-UK]

There's a UK website that sells Russian body armour, I'm not sure if they'd ship over there, but they do claim it will stop/slow (can't really remember which) up to 7.62 bullets.

It goes for about £300, maybe a bit pricey, but if you want, I'll post the link.

[Joejojoba111]

That does sound interesting, is it the titaium plates by chance?

As for other people's backyard testing, the search engines yield little better than this:

http://savvysurvivor.com.cnchost.com/PASGTarmortest.htm

http://savvysurvivor.com.cnchost.com/body_armor_ballistic_tests.htm

[G36-UK]

Yes, I believe so.

There's also a reduction of 17.5% (VAT rates here) for anyone outside the EU, so that may come in handy for you guys.

They do straight pull rifles for the lucky few of us who own FACs, and they do have quite a few parts for the rifles themselves.

Here's the site: Rusmilitary (http://www.rusmilitary.com/index.htm)

Here's the link to the armour vests. (http://www.rusmilitary.com/html/bulletproof_vests.htm)

Hope that helps.

[Joejojoba111]

Those prices look a little steep. Is it really like $2500 bucks for an SVD Dragunov? They must not sell many.

[G36-UK]

Not sure where you saw that, all I can see are the deacts.

£839 for a deact SVD and £850 for a deact SVDS.

[Joejojoba111]

It's my secret ability. You'd be amazed how often I go to a harmless web page. but sniff out a link to a gunshop.

...Or maybe it was the glowing red elipse 'FIREARMS'
:neener:

Still a cool site.