About time.

Saw on Futureweapons where they took the Dragon Skin and laid it on a grenade. The mannequin was unharmed.

"Dragon Skin" - as in the stuff the troops were told not to buy on their own and wear? THe DoD has finally figured out it is ok. Niiiiiiice.

Didn't the Pentagon just last week come out and say that the Dragon Skin vests were crap? The spokesman was showing videos of DoD tests on them in which they failed at nearly every test compared to the standard-issue ones.


Pops.

So that's what happens when the campaign checks stop coming...

Where's Tony Stark when you need him?

The Erratic Escape Artist

Oh... that's right.

Editor's Note: I'm not gonna spoil it! See The Mighty Avengers Issue #1.

ravenssettle: Saw on Futureweapons where they took the Dragon Skin and laid it on a grenade.

Ditto, saw it on futureweapons, mail call, and one or two other shows (modern marvels maybe?).

ten_of_spades: Didn't the Pentagon just last week come out and say that the Dragon Skin vests were crap?

Read the wiki on the tests it's gone through and look at the references.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_Skin_body_armor#Testing

ravenssettle: The mannequin's torso was unharmed

ftfy. But it still looked pretty cool. The inner lining of the vest never appeared to be compromized.

ravenssettle: Saw on Futureweapons where they took the Dragon Skin and laid it on a grenade. The mannequin was unharmed.

I saw that, too. Very cool, although that guy would have had other problems, like having his face blown off.

Bonzo_1116: So that's what happens when the campaign checks stop coming...

Bingo!

Hooray! Epic gear, finally!

lol- someone at Interceptor forgot to payoff a congressman.

Most of the people getting killed over there are not from direct fire bullets but from frag from IEDs. This will significantly improve the survivability and 360 protection.

DaCricket: Interceptor is rated Level IV.

My understanding is Interceptor has huge problems. Like the plates break upon impact, making them useless for taking more than a single round each before being replaced.

There was a dateline special on this (or some show like it).

The gist of it was that there were some questionable relationships between the general in charge of the testing and the makers of interceptor. He now works for a company that makes interceptor armor.

During the testing, the general limited who could witness it as well.

So basically, this is just a matter of redoing the tests in a hopefully LESS fishy environment and then let the armor's quality speak for itself. It may fail...it may not. But hopefully its a fair test and there are no appearances of conflicts of interest.

Neeek

Not true- I have a l4 plate. I never shot it with AP rounds but I dit shoot it 5 times from 20 feet away with a 300 WinMag and none of them penetrated it.

Saw on Futureweapons where they took the Dragon Skin and laid it on a grenade. The mannequin was unharmed.

I'm not sure that protection against a grenade is actually as difficult as protection against a rifle. I mean, there are lots of little pieces of metal, but are they going as fast as the one single piece of metal that comes out of a rifle? I don't honestly know the answer to that question.

Okay, anti-ballistic armor is pretty neat.

Someone let me know when we get some power armor up in here.

We are the 21st century...I say it's about time our soldiers look more like video games.

The other thing we need are quicksaves, of course.

Re: level 3 vs level 4 armor: Yeah, but is the Dragon Skin significantly easier to wear than Interceptor? Somebody in the Army, go down to your PX, grab an Army Times and get back here on the double. They're running a story on it.
(contractor, saw it on the shelf).

If the DS is easier to wear, I get the feeling your average soldier will suddenly remember "hey, know what the best armor is? A wall or a foxhole I can duck behind if I can run fast enough...which I sure as shiat can't do in Interceptor"

It has the accuracy of a sniper rifle with the power of an M-16!

The interceptor sapi plate can take 3 Nato 7.62 rounds spread out. It's ceramic, when the bullet hits it crumbles. BUT it's a fair sight better than the ballistic nylon jackets they replaced, that had NO plate, and the steel chicken plates.

A lot of articles have been coming out about Interceptor V Dragonskin armor. Frankly I'd rather be in Interceptor.

The Dragonskin sounds awesome, like chain mail for the 21st century. Problems come quickly after that though. The plates overlap and if hit square they're decent enough for first strike survivability, but at an angle they have chinks and gaps and suddenly they turn into bullet funnels. In 150 degree heat for 6 hours, the glue unbinds and the plates fall to the bottom of the pouch. If the thing was a few inches longer it'd provide excellent coverage for the family jewels but as it is, it provides good coverage to the lower abdomen while jingling and providing nothing for the vital organs above the belt line.

Another problem, the glue used is reactive with diesel fuel. The glue unbinds and the plates fall down, and the plates themselves become weaker when exposed to diesel. This is important because our vehicles use diesel and an IED is going to splash alot of that around and just fueling a vehicle up is going to get some on the soldiers from time to time. Want your vest to fall apart because you topped off the tank?

The other gripe soldiers have is that Interceptor weighs in at 26 pounds. Dragon skin weighs in at about 47 pounds. Their current combat load weighs up to 80 pounds, this vest would push them to 100 pounds. You want to be the soldier running across a wide street with 100 pounds on your back? You're going to waddle slowly and get shot. Hope the vest works, but eventually someones gonna get your legs or head and you'll be very dead.

Dragon skin is a good idea,but it's current design would be a couple gens back for the soldiers fighting in Iraq. They can't survive equipment that falls apart in heat, with fuel exposure, or weighs 20+ pounds more than what they already have.

they stopped allowing dragon skin due to the fact that it was melting and sticking to the skin of soliders in IED attacks. It was determined that the Interceptor body armor was more safe. The military is very strict about this.

Is everyone sure Stone Phillips didn't strap a firecracker to it?

Dragon Skin is overrated crap that is going to get soldiers killed because a clueless media is hyping it like crazy, and people who don't know the first damned thing about it are saying it is better than Interceptor, just because.

Dragon Skin ain't all that.

DaCricket

That's what I was going to say.

We were told we could choose, but we have a lot of non-issue items.

FuturePastNow: like having his face blown off.

I'm sure he didn't need it.

You're a Mean Drunk R2D2: I don't honestly know the answer to that question.

Faster I believe. If not then it would be close enough.

Ouch. When I read the pdf in the Army Times, I thought there was a typo--Dragon Skin, 47 pounds?

Forget what I said. Jesus, I wouldn't want to have to haul my ass around in that biatch alone, much less with an ALICE rig and rifle in hand.

future weapons testing of dragon skin *pops*

Pinnacle has competed for Army contracts on body armor but lost out five times because its product did not meet specifications.

At least their lobbyists are doing a good job, even if their product is a 50lb failure-prone bag of hype.

Detroit_Bob:

Umm ok, so you just gobble up the Pentagon party line eh? Third party testing doesn't interest you?

Dragon Skin might not be totally better than interceptor in ALL conditions, but the Pentagon makes it out to be worst than wearing a t-shirt. The Dateline show, Futureweapons, Modern Marvels, etc each showed that in testing conditions, the DragonSkin took as many if not more rifle rounds than the interceptor.

Also dragonskin wraps around your torso, which interceptor does not. Infinitely more protection there.

There were also unconfirmed reports that VIPs were given concealed dragonskin armor to wear. Also confirmed reports that CIA operatives were issued dragonskin armor.

Not to mention, the inventor of interceptor went on Dateline to say that dragon skin was superior.

Of course shady business with the Pentagon and contracts is nothing new. Heck, the Pentagon blasted the M-16 when it was first shown and want to shove it up Stoner's behind. Now they can't stop using it.

To clarify, I'm not saying the Dragonskin should be the new armor of choice for our boys in Iraq. I'm just skeptical that the Pentagon tests were done fairly. They said the dragonskin couldn't take more than 1 or 2 rifle shots but in various 3rd party tests it was shown to take many.

When the first M-16's were issued they jammed and got a lot of guys killed/wounded. Given some emergency field cleaning kits helped but it was months after the rifle hit the field before they became available.

VIP's may have used it, considering they aren't exposed to heat or diesel fumes it takes care of two of the largest fears with the gear. How those old VIP's felt lugging 50lbs of armor around has me curious though. Wonder if any of them got older gear that'd been worn a few times, tossed around, beaten up like field soldiers would?

poisonpill:

The testing of the armor was done in a third party lab (HP White).

I could go over all the points about this argument, but Defense Tech has the best roundup and analysis I've seen.

Go Here and check it out including video of the failed DragonSkin test.

You're a Mean Drunk R2D2
I'm not sure that protection against a grenade is actually as difficult as protection against a rifle. I mean, there are lots of little pieces of metal, but are they going as fast as the one single piece of metal that comes out of a rifle? I don't honestly know the answer to that question.

I'm not sure one is more or less difficult, they are testing different but perhaps equally difficult and important properties.

A grenade has a LOT more total kinetic energy than a bullet. On the other hand, a bullet, though its total energy is much lower, concentrates that energy at a single point while the grenade disperses the energy across all of the exposed surface. The energy per square inch at that single point is higher than anything the grenade can do.

So the grenade test shows how it handles a huge amount of energy, and the bullet test shows how it handles a huge concentration of energy. It's quite possible to have armor that is effective versus grenades and ineffective versus bullets, or the reverse too.

Something I just noticed in the article, they say the Dragonskin weighs less than Interceptor armor with plates, where everywhere else I'd read that the Interceptor armor weighed about half what Dragonskin does.

eericson:

That was a good read and I'm sure it's possible the Army did give it a decent go-around. But that still doesn't explain why there are several other videos of dragon skin stopping higher that required ammunition.

Also, it doesn't explain why CIA operatives use dragon skin. (and who knows what other branches)

About the weight, here's a quote from some message board. Take it as you will since we all know stuff on the internet can easily be total BS:

"having done two tours of Iraq and preparing for a third, I can tell you that Interceptor (with all plates) weighs MORE than 50LBS. Yes, I flipp'n said MORE. IT WEIGHS MORE THAN FIFTY POUNDS WITH ALL ACCESSORIES. GET IT?? Dragon Skin DOES NOT WEIGH MORE THAN INTERCEPTOR! GET IT?? Interceptor LIMITS MOBILITY, FAILS AFTER MULTIPLE IMPACTS"