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southfork | 10-15-2006 03:17 PM
Need Body armor My son in law is going to Iraq in Jan. I need the best lightweight full body armor made, any suggestions and links are appreciated.

softserve320 | 10-15-2006 03:36 PM
Re: Need Body armor http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?...9&archive=true Here's an article that may give you a head's up about body armor that has not been 'approved'. All my best:rose:

j-son | 10-15-2006 04:02 PM
Re: Need Body armor http://www.pinnaclearmor.com/dragon-skin-survivors.php dragon skin is the stuff to get they dont use it in the military for cost reasons....but its well worth it

citizenkane | 10-15-2006 04:06 PM
Re: Need Body armor hopefully you can talk him out of going. join Watada...... http://www.thankyoult.org/ what if they gave a war and nobody went. :)

Curtman | 10-15-2006 04:19 PM
Re: Need Body armor Quote:
Originally Posted by southfork (Post 387674) My son in law is going to Iraq in Jan. I need the best lightweight full body armor made, any suggestions and links are appreciated.
Army or Marines? You may be able to get a PM or email through to Wallew, he would be right on top of this.

southfork | 10-15-2006 04:43 PM
Re: Need Body armor Army or Marines? You may be able to get a PM or email through to Wallew, he would be right on top of this. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Army

Curtman | 10-15-2006 04:59 PM
Re: Need Body armor Ask Wallew. Also do a search on the site here because this has been discussed many times before and to some good conclusion. Since he is in the Army I am guessing he either is in supply or transportation battalion. If so it is great that you can do this for him. If he is a helicopter mechanic or tech he will be in a safer area. You will want to send the body armor to him once he is there in the case they may not want him to have anything that is not general issue at first. I wish I knew more to tell you but I do not. Try and get Wallew to answer your questions, if he does not know, he sure can find out.

REV127 | 10-15-2006 07:34 PM
Re: Need Body armor Here is a list of rifle plates from a good vendor. The polyethylene is by far the lightest armor available on the market, it is also thicker than other materials but it offers protection against the majority of threats he will encounter even if he is infantry. Don't forget the side plates, linked at the top of the page. http://www.bulletproofme.com/Body_Ar...otection.shtml Your son in law is more than a torso though so you'll want to get him more than just body armor. For one thing the standard issue k-pot does not offer all the protection it should. This is one of the best available to you, http://www.bulletproofme.com/PHOTO%2...lmets-MICH.htm That is just a start, though. If he is in a combat MOS his head will by necessity be one of the most exposed parts of his body in a firefight. For that reason you will want him to have a pair of Oakley M-Frame sunglasses. The lenses in the M-Frames will stop a 9mm handgun at close range, you may not feel good afterwards but it beats a bullet straight through your eye. Take your son in law to the Oakley store in the mall to get fitted and pick the lense style that fits his facial contours the best. Don't stop there, however. Get him a pair of the triple lense ballistic goggles, to be worn over the M-Frames. It would also behoove you to get him one of the ballistic face shields, make sure it is the ballistic face shield and not a riot face shield. All these but the M-Frames are found on the link below, http://www.bulletproofme.com/Body_Ar...otection.shtml A kevlar soft body armor with collar, shoulder and groin protection is a great boon as well. Below is an example. http://www.bulletproofme.com/PHOTO%2...Protectors.htm The Interceptor body armor they are issuing is a primitive, heavy and inferior form of armor. It is heads and shoulders above the old PASGT system it replaces, but that isn't saying much. My PASGT vest before any user modification regularly opened wide whenever I had to get down on the ground due to its poorly designed velcro fastner, but that is another story. Anyway, stick with kevlar for any soft body armor. Remember to get him a Level IIIA helmet which offers much better protection than his issue helmet. Get him ballistic eye protection, face protection will help with IED's. Shoulder, side and groin protection will round it out. You can buy all this stuff in function form at the Bullet Proof Me site, I've used them myself. All this stuff is available elsewhere, as well, in various forms produced by various manufacturers. Dragonskin will protect you however I differ with common opinion and see it just as another primitive vest that does not address a great number of practical considerations of ballistic combat and instead tries to sell itself on flexibility which is rather a non-issue if you have a well fitted harness in the first place.

southfork | 10-15-2006 09:36 PM
Re: Need Body armor Thank you all, I was wondering if there was a hi tech type of like long johns also , cost is not an issue. I want the best and the lightest. thanks.

Prometheus | 10-15-2006 09:43 PM
Re: Need Body armor Quote:
Originally Posted by j-son (Post 387693) http://www.pinnaclearmor.com/dragon-skin-survivors.php dragon skin is the stuff to get they dont use it in the military for cost reasons....but its well worth it
I agree. After months of begging the military brass, they finally gave dragon skin a full military test. It made the current interceptors look like crap. When prices finally drop down, I plan on buying some for myself to replace my interceptor. Southfork, tell him to keep his head down and watch his six for me. My brother has made 3 trips (twice to asscrack once to iraq)... I feel for you.

southfork | 10-15-2006 09:45 PM
Re: Need Body armor agree. After months of begging the military brass, they finally gave dragon skin a full military test. It made the current interceptors look like crap. When prices finally drop down, I plan on buying some for myself to replace my interceptor. Southfork, tell him to keep his head down and watch his six for me. My brother has made 3 trips (twice to asscrack once to iraq)... I feel for you. __________________ Molon Labe +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ My thanks for your sentiments, if your so inclined to do so remember him in your prayers.

eat_beef | 10-16-2006 10:45 AM
Re: Need Body armor How much does the dragon skin cost? I couldn't find a price on the website. Also, does anyone make a helmet that will stop rifle rounds? I'm not sure about the difference between a 70 frn USGI helmet vs a 500frn level III.:confused:

REV127 | 10-16-2006 12:18 PM
Re: Need Body armor You won't find a helmet made to stop direct hits from a rifle unless it is custom as their are weight and material limitations. The Germans back in WWI or WWII had at least an experimental rifle plate for the forehead as part of their sniper armor, if you managed to find such a rare antique that would be the closest you could probably get. A standard PASGT kevlar helmet is a good piece of gear, especially for when it was first introduced, but it only stops around a level IIA or II threat. 7.62x25 fired from a pistol will zip right on in. Level IIIA is still not rifle proof per se but will protect you from higher grade threats than the standard issue helmet will. This becomes a real factor when we're talking about rifle bullets that have passed through an intermediate barrier, were fired from a distance or otherwise have bled off a lot of their initial speed and energy but remain dangerous. All that said, the PASGT helmet will deflect some rifle fire if they strike at enough of an angle but it will ring your bells for sure. There was a widely publicized case of this sometime early on in the Kosovo adventure. The level IIIA helmet will do the same, but better. In the case of the MICH helmet I linked to it also has an upgraded suspension system. Eventually everybody will be getting an example of the newer generation of higher rated helmets, there are variants on the theme from a number of manufacturers being adopted by different military units around the world who can afford them. The other aspect here is you get what you pay for. $70 won't even buy a new PASGT helmet, you're getting a used article for that price and it may or may not be old enough or abused enough to be subject to degradation in protection level. The brain bucket is one of those critical pieces of gear, if you have a $70 head you get the $70 helmet. You can't shoot the badguy unless you can see him and you can't see him without exposing at least a little of your head and one of your eyes. Dragon Skin will cost you around four thousand dollars if you can find it. Curiously, it is level III/IV torso armor. You can even approach or beat its weight for equivalent coverage with all three major hard armor altnernatives, even steel. The only issue Dragon Skin really address is fit, and plate armor can be fitted to the individual just as well as armor made of lots of little disks. It is worlds better than the IBA, but the IBA sucks and most other armor is better than it, too. I really wish some manufacturer would start making armor that does more than cling to your torso and wait for you to be shot so it can attempt to defeat incoming fire right on top of your vital organs. That is no kind of thinking. If you have the money and can get the Dragon Skin, do so, it will protect you. If you're handy and understand anything about armouring and firefights you can probably do better in your workshop for less money. Then the government won't let you use it, but they will deliberately poison you with DU. Go figure.

eat_beef | 10-16-2006 01:33 PM
Re: Need Body armor I know what you mean about the cheap helmets. I may grab one anyway. I'll either upgrade later, or I'll have something as opposed to the nothing I have now. Armor is on my list, just not at the top. Hard to cover all the bases, and I don't really plan on engaging anyone in a toe to toe fight. I have the advantage of being in the sticks and knowing my area well, and I hope to be able to melt away if I should need to. I don't have any rambo visions of taking on swat teams.:rofl:

REV127 | 10-16-2006 02:03 PM
Re: Need Body armor Any helmet beats no helmet, I'd take one of the old WWII surplus steel pots if that's all I had. That said, don't let the high cost of top end armor scare you away. A Dragon Skin vest costs more than an entire ensemble of nearly anything else. Here's a comparative breakdown. PASGT helmet, new: $200 Level II kevlar vest, new: $380 Stand alone Level III Rifle plate, steel, new: $110 For about $700 out the door you could have a good degree of head and torso protection at your disposal, total weight will be around 18lbs. The Level II vest is thin enough to be concealable so you can wear it around town. In addition to stopping bullets these vests have been known to save lives in car crashes by protecting against blunt trauma and impalement. I wore one religiously when I was a professional driver, for both reasons. The steel rifle plate is durable, multi-hit capable and provides rifle protection without the need for a vest. If you only had $300 to spend I'd buy the new PASGT helmet and the rifle plate. Chances are as a homeowner defending your house or family you will be facing the badguy anyway so the back and side protection will not be as critical as head and chest protection. Rambo? Legions of Doom? Nah, just attach a gasoline tank in line with your sprinkler system and hose'em down from the safety of your own garage. Most people, when soaked in gasoline, would say to themselves "screw this! I'm going home!" They certainly wouldn't want to shoot you at that point, at least. :D

Hivemindgammahydra7 | 10-16-2006 05:44 PM
Re: Need Body armor I can't find prices on the site for Dragon Skin. Did I miss them or do they not sell to the public?

REV127 | 10-16-2006 08:14 PM
Re: Need Body armor Last time I looked into it, admittedly this was long ago, they were not offering it to the general public and it wasn't any easier to find. If you hang around the kind of tactical sites where everybody tells eachother how uber they are you'll probably be able to find more up to date availability info. These usually don't let you browse their content without logging in so search for the forums themselves and not key words for the product. You can check the usual suspect online retailers, too, but most of them won't sell to you unless your military ID is still valid.

REV127 | 10-16-2006 10:13 PM
Re: Need Body armor Blarg! I just spent a long time digging through a bunch of stuff to get a better answer for you. The only thing I can offer is the following, either contact Pinnacle or check the for sale sections on the aforementioned tactical forums. I was pouring over some material posted by the inventor/owner of Dragon Skin and the surrounding discussion with end users. Apparently there has been quality control issues with some of the ceramic disks that lead to failures to stop threats that the inventor/owner and users felt should have been stopped even though lower grade threats were defeated. These lead to a recall on a batch of medium LVL III vests. As for weight, since that was a criteria in the original post, there doesn't seem to be much weight savings to be had with Dragon Skin per se, just a little increased coverage area. The LVL III wrap around vest weighs 16.5lbs, the LVL IV wrap around weighs in at 33lbs, about even with the IBA. Bulk is an issue as the nominal thickness of the vest is nearly an inch and this is doubled on the sides where there is overlap. Polyethylene LVL III+ plates, the lightest equivalent protection available, are also about an inch thick all around but don't have the doubling effect on the sides. Dragon Skin has made saves, otoh at least one Dragon Skin owner in the sandbox has laid his aside in favor of plates in a carrier sans vest to reduce the weight of his combat load without sacraficing too much protection. Oh, and steer clear of commercially available ESAPI plates, apparently they are sourced from military production rejects. I would tend to avoid ceramic plates anyway as they have durability and multihit issues and are not remarkable in any particular way, be it weight or cost or performance.

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