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Those are steel threaded suits that helped us achieve the same electrical potential as the energized power line circuit.

Good question!

Honestly I don’t remember how we found it. We have several methods to locate these damaged areas: 1. Comprehensive visual inspections. 2. Infra-red imaging. 3. Corona “arcing” camera. Sometimes the IR and Corona would light up together and that helped. Working inside of two circuits and between phases required us to be pretty precise because the last thing we wanted was to go phase to ground or phase to phase.

Excellent question. Chinese manufacturers use a chloroprene rubber non-heat activated adhesive. In the US, we mostly use heat activated adhesive sheets. The polyethylene backers are considered “low energy” material, so the resins in the PE normally match up with the ingredients within the adhesive sheets. For example, if you are working with a PE with polyolefin resins, you would generally select a polyolefin thermal adhesive. Not all PE has the same resins, so pairing up adhesives can be tricky and the adhesives are extremely important and will make or break effectiveness in armor. Most professional builders/manufacturers in the USA use a company called Pontacol to obtain their adhesives. However, this company is not a US company… so Made in USA really means “except the adhesive”. We wanted to develop a US adhesive with US sourced ingredients that is low VOC and CA Prop 65 compliant. The adhesive we use is thermally activated but is a flashed heat adhesive, meaning that it is not necessary to spend high time periods under heat (which can weaken PE chemical bonds). Adhesive use in armor is critical and not only is the correct product required, but proper pressure and temperature are also important. We can’t disclose the exact ingredients we use but they work very well with various types of PE resins… even water based polyurethane. We are considering offering our armor adhesives in the general market under our name brand next year. We are working on the MDS and SDS currently. No final decision on that yet.

Another brand of adhesive available is an American brand. It s a product called “T-Link”. It’s an epoxy with no release liners. It’s easy to use but requires a higher activation temperature. We have not been able to use it effectively with our material in R and D scenarios, so we opted to develop something else. We are also slowly making headway with Pontacol to test a couple of their products alongside of ours for upcoming 2025 projects.

It’s a younger man’s work but glad I was able to do it for a few years.

So why then would you trust a single piece? After one shot, there are lots of uncontrolled cracks. I have built mosaic style armor for many years and it’s much more effective against multiple shots. This style has been used for decades in personal armor and even vehicle armor. Check out our website and test reports… you won’t find better performance all documented with NIJ approved labs.

Many armor designs incorporate a foam or rubber edge (thin strip) that protects the ceramic edge. Ballistic ceramic is very durable, especially at high purity levels. With the correct adhesives and a crack arresting layer to protect the ceramic… it can take significant abuse. Mosaic arrays are generally more resistant to cracking and breaking than monolithics but not always. Using the materials I describe above, the builder can create what I call a “marble effect”. It’s like dropping a marble on a hard surface because of the PE backer and crack arresting layer saturated strike face ceramic in adhesive - all encapsulating and protecting the underlying material.

😃

😂 that’s many years ago and I would probably miss the whole thing now

Thank you much for your trust. We do have multi-curved monolithics using Bitossi tile. My own personal experience has been that the mosaics offer superior multi-hit protection, especially when the shots are close together. Thanks again.

Check out the last video I just uploaded.

Hello - hands full with ceramic plates. We do carry a Big and Tall carrier on our site made with 3 plies of 1670 denier ballistic nylon.

I see the NIJ notice… was there something else actually from LTC?

Some companies use a smaller, retracted strike face to save on weight… a 10x12 plate in alumina goes from 8 pounds to 6 by removing 1” along the edge and replacing it with foam!

Ballistic ceramic tile really isn’t the type of ceramic or porcelain that people think of. It is far more dense. Feldspar based ingredients in porcelain are interesting but I don’t know any manufacturers offering these types of materials for widespread use. The most common ceramic ballistic tile are aluminum oxide, sintered or reaction bonded silicon carbide, boron carbide and more common, a silicon and boride hybrid. Outside of those materials I don’t have much technical knowledge of porcelains. Thanks for the question. It’s a good one.

My experience with that is that projectile fragments still exit the PE steel interface layer. Fragments move parallel to the steel strike face and out the adhesive layer. Especially true with larger calibers.

When combining materials you always have to remember that the post-impact motion of projectiles is not always from front to back. The “give” of a PE backer helps keep the projectile and fragments moving in a strike face to wear face motion (good). But with steel, there is no gradual deceleration and fragmentation which means that the fragments splash against the strike face and move parallel… which unfortunately is aligned with materials boundary layers and adhesive layers. This results in delamination of all sorts and fragments moving upwards and outwards toward plate periphery (where you are).

Water based polyethylene resins in certain PE raw materials have great elongation properties.

Thanks man!

These tests were performed by Energetic Lab in accordance with the 0101.07 NIJ approved, P-BFD 6 shot requirement for RF3 armor 0101.07 standard (p.19-20). P-BFD (Perforation-Backface Deformation ) is relevant to performance under a max 44mm BFD. That was the purpose of our test. Ballistic Limit Performance requirements are complete penetration only tests where regression analysis is applied to predict probable failure velocities (see Appendix D). You can choose 1,2,3 or 6 shots for all CTP testing but after the armor is NIJ certified - there’s only 1 shot for FIT testing and it’s only a test for complete penetration, NOT the 44mm BFD limit. I wanted to explain this for everyone that might not know. In the end, there will be no RF3 armor certified for “more than one” shot.

Other than conditioning and drops, the NIJ 0101.07 RF3 ballistic P-BFD and Ballistic Limit performance requires a single hit of .30M2AP (below 44mm due to the P-BFD requirement) and Ballistic Limit analysis indicating that the armor can perform over a wide range of velocities with a “low” probability of a complete penetration. Our two reports were very solid performances… especially since these were initial design confirmation tests for the NIJ CTP application process.

The adhesives require some heat to activate. We then keep pressure on during the cool down to room temp. Heat is dangerous for PE so you have to limit the time… freezing does not make the ceramic harder in any appreciable way as far as I know! Our adhesives are good to -40F

You can buy our OA+ outsourced version for $99 each… check the ballistics report. Stopped 4 rounds of .30 M2AP. Doesn’t have to be expensive or require a trip to Lowe’s.

Ha! Check out my video just before this one. So, hitting it with a hammer wasn’t enough?

Thanks!

A blend of performance, weight and cost effectiveness… thanks

Hello - very interesting and thank you for sharing that info. There is no metal in our plates… we use ceramic to UHMWPE via adhesive interface that is non-epoxy and will elongate enough to absorb energy. Some models have a carbon/aramid thermoplastic on the wear face.

Yes, this can be done especially if the tile are the same thickness to prevent problems with uniform crack arresting layer adhesion to the ceramic. Thing to watch out for is that SiC and alumina don’t quite bond to other materials exactly the same way. You have to find something that will bond both types to each other and then to the PE backing material. Be sure to clean the SiC very well with acetone and water wash- the dust can interfere w bonding. I have done several sets of hybrid plates where the weight can be reduced this way… if you can solve the other issues.

BONUS: you can play checkers on the strike face!

It blew up alright! Blew some M80A1 into our armor plates!

Interesting but the tile themselves are not enough. Usually 35-45 layers of PE needs to back the ceramic for rifle protection. Total number varies and testing is needed!

For?

All well-built edge to edge armor plate has some outside edge protection… usually a 1-2mm foam or rubber strip. If the ceramic covers 100% of the back plate - it’s edge to edge.

Really depends on how the manufacturers address mechanical drop treatment (foam, for example). If a crack already exists (ceramic tile array), does dropping make it more or less likely to form a new crack between boundaries? Great question and I would argue that the smaller pieces (50mm) when adhered together with elongating adhesive are able to flex more than a single piece making them less vulnerable. But- in either case, well-manufactured ceramic armor is not vulnerable to normal wear and tear as you describe. You have to be VERY CAREFUL to avoid non-NIJ certified armor that also does not incorporate crack arrestors that would restrict damages in cases such as you suggest.

Would not ever wear steel. That’s just me. I’ve hit steel plates with .30-06 and .308 and knocked the frag coating off in one shot.

Hi-definitely ceramic. Lots of reasons why and I’ll do another video on this topic soon.

Good question but never use bathroom tile. This is specialized ballistic ceramic that undergoes powder pressing and kiln heat / cool for hours that increases its density. Much different than bathroom tile.

Some manufacturers use an injecting process also… but these tile are not everyday ceramic construct.

There’s A LOT more to it than that… check out some of our testing videos on the channel.

Yes they are! Model 9049 on website RF3 section. With or without trauma reducer plates.

The hex tile is purchased through select sources that can match our specs. Unless you are trying to go with a multicurved shape, would suggest using a 2” tile first and a monolithic as a secondary choice.

Thank you.

We actually can as long as you meet NY state law requirements.

Thanks

Thank you

Glad it was helpful!

Several of these combos on the website. Here is one of them: gilliamtechnicalservices.com/products/model-6909-set-edge-to-edge-rf2-level-3-or-rf3-level-4-shooters-cut-sapi-cut-ceramic-armor

Depends on how far apart they are and what the projectiles are. In general, mosaic tile with polyethylene backers are very good performers versus monolithic plates especially with glass backers.