What Types of Body Armor are there?

What types of body armor are there?

While body armor comes in many forms, the first thing to understand is the materials used to make armor. Materials such as aramid fibers, ballistic steel and ceramics are the basic construction materials. Carbon Nanotube fibers have also been employed. All have been improved since their original inception.

For soft body armor woven DuPont™ Kevlar® (Stephanie Kwolek, a DuPont scientist, invented Kevlar in 1965) is the first of the “aramid” fibers to be patented for this purpose and is still the most widely used material; it continues to be improved. Other materials that have come along are other polyethylene fibers (Ultra High Molecular Weight Polyethylene – UHMWPE), generally classified as aramid fibers due to the trademarking of DuPont™ Kevlar®. Carbon nanotube materials have also been used but became increasingly expensive while offering no better performance.

AR500 Armor’s® soft body armor is constructed using DuPont™ Kevlar® and other aramid fibers that includes Honeywell’s Spectra Shield® and Gold Shield®.

For hard body armor ballistic steel, with a Brinell Hardness Rating of 504 or greater is identified as AR500 steel throughout the industry and is the basis for ballistic steel plates rated at NIJ Level III for rifle level protection. Here at AR500 Armor we also offer Level III+ and Level III+ Lightweight rifle plates made with ballistic steel that exceeds the required Brinell rating and in cuts that reduce the weight, while defeating more powerful rifle rounds. Ceramics are also used for hard body armor and rated at NIJ Level IV due to their ability to also stop the 30-06 AMP2 (7.62 x 63 165gr) Armor Piercing Black Tip Rounds. 

In today’s world the state of the art is that soft body armor is effective against mainly pistol rounds and steel and ceramics are required to stop the higher velocity rifle rounds police, civilians and most military might expect to face. This is somewhat an oversimplification as there are .50 cal handguns and .22 cal rifles; suffice to say that many variables come into play driven by the physics of the materials, the bullets and the attributes of the weapons that deliver them. The velocity that a round is traveling is the most important of the many factors involved, so, with lots of disclaimers, you might see an extra 20 to 60 fps of extra velocity with each extra inch of barrel length when looking at pistol calibers being fired from rifles. 

With so many different rounds that can be delivered from weapons of differing barrel length, the dynamics of velocity, distance to impact, terminal velocity, grains of powder, the shape of the bullet and construction materials utilized in the bullet all come into play, as well as temperature, humidity and on and on. So, in trying to come up with a cost-effective solution for threat protection (body armor) the approach of the NIJ has been to define a common denominator set of pistol and rifle rounds most likely to be faced and test against this set.

So, to repeat the simple guideline from above: soft body armor for pistol level threats, hard body armor (steel, ceramics) for rifle threats and stabbing weapons.

What are the differentiators someone should consider when deciding on what type of body armor best meets their needs, the threats they expect to face?

• Threats – pistol, rifle, stabbing weapons (corrections officers)
• Carrier design, capacities, mission color (yes, this is important) and functionality
• Weight – steel can be as lightweight as 5 lbs. per plate and as heavy as 8 lbs. per plate depending on the size (10” x 12” vs 11” x 15”), the cut (square, shooters cut, advanced shooters cut), the core steel material -standard AR500, Lightweight AR500, Lightweight+ AR500; ceramics offer some reduced weight solutions but are often thicker 
• Single hit or multi-hit protection –  all steel plates are multi-hit capable so, while ceramics offer the best protection against rifle rounds and can be certified to meet NIJ Level IV protection – 30-06 AMP2 (7.62 x 63 165gr) Armor Piercing Black Tip Rounds, some are single hit only as the design of the underlying structure is such that the entire ceramic plate is “consumed” with the energies from the first round. Others, more expensive, using a tiled structure as opposed to a webbed design and are multi-hit capable as the energy is absorbed by the tiles impacted as opposed to the entire surface of the plate.

Anyone working with prisoners in a correctional facility or in their transport could face stabbing threats and pistol threats in the normal course of their duties. Soft armor, Level IIIA, while effective against pistol rounds up to a .44 magnum, is not going to provide much in the way of protection from stabbing weapons as the materials used harden on absorbed energy from the impact of a bullet whereas a shive (crude homemade knife), or knife may push right through because a stabbing weapon does not deliver enough kinetic energy to activate the materials. In this case AR500 Armor offers a Level IIIA steel plate that is lightweight, fits in all carriers that can handle the normal 10″ x 12″ plate size and provides Level IIIA protection against pistols and protection against stabbing weapons.