Posted on 05/23/2007 9:16:09 AM PDT by Islander7
The Army plans to brief Congress about test failures of Dragon Skin body armor after recent news reports touting the vest's capabilities prompted calls from lawmakers for an official explanation.
The service's top soldier equipment buyer, Brig. Gen. Mark Brown, said he plans to meet with lawmakers and staff this week after NBC News broadcast an investigative report Sunday claiming Dragon Skin - which uses a series of interlocking ceramic disks to stop armor-piercing bullets - outperformed armor currently issued by the Army.
"Since the report, we have gotten a flurry of interest" from Capitol Hill, Brown said at a May 21 Pentagon briefing. "We're planning on going over to the Hill ... for discussions with key members."
--SNIP--
The Dragon Skin vests tested by the Army in May suffered 13 penetrations in 48 shots, service officials said.
(Excerpt) Read more at military.com ...
Sorry, it isn't gonna happen. We could buy a tank for each individual soldier and load him up with 200lbs of personal body armor but that's not going to happen either.
Did the armor survive when an rigged Ford was exploded on top of it?
Wasn’t it NBC that “blew up the truck” when they couldn’t get the gas tank to ignite?...
13 penetrations by what caliber and at what range? And how many penetrations would be suffered by the existing armor under the same conditions?
7.62.
Many of these companies are owned by passionate types who really want to protect soldiers.
However, I’m pretty satisfied that the army has crushed this media manipulated story.
1. The armor doesn’t hold up in humidity (next to a human body at 120 degrees) or high temps. The plates start to separate.
2. It’s too heavy, restricting mobility. Spec ops and other high mobility troops already complain about armor that constrains them from being able to move and duck to avoid fire.
3. The press already made fun when the army attempted to adapt anti-bomb armor to non-mobile troops manning gun mounts. There are trade offs with armor for the body, just as with tanks.
And how many penetrations are required to kill?
Wrong. sftt.org (Soldiers For The Truth) Col. David Hackworth’s group has been hammering the Pentagon on this for over two years.
NBC just ran the story that they had been reporting since early 2005. All State Dept people are issued DragonSkin, and a lot of the private security firms over there were purchasing it.
Even the man who designed the current Interceptor vest says DragonSkin is a better product. Heck, if I go again, I’ll be buying it for myself.
If the armor currently in use would get more than 13 penetrations under the same conditions, then the new armor would be an improvement, is the point that I was trying to make
Don’t tell this to Hillary. It was Bush’s fault that everyone in the military wasn’t wearing 14 inches of plate steal at all times.
from the article:
“According to Karl Masters, one of the Army’s top ballistics experts, the Dragon Skin failed to stop a 7.62 x 63mm APM2 round on the second shot of the test.”
7.62x63NATO is the equivalent to 30-06 round! M240B or M60 use 7.62x51 NATO round, while the Dragunov fires a 7.62x54. AK-47 fires a 7.62x39.
I’m not sure who uses a 7.62x63, these days.
I’m not sure, but I did see an Army General hold up the round and a piece of the dragonskin armor to explain the problem to the clueless reporters.
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