Enhanced Headborne Protection

Offentlig prosjektsammendrag

Traditional manufacturing methods for highly curved ballistic composites normally apply a non-uniform (one-directional) pressure across the surface of the product. This will then result in reduced ballistic properties in the areas of lower pressure, i.e. where the applied force gets close to parallel to the material. A way to overcome the lost ballistic properties can be to add extra material in these regions in order to increase the pressure from the two-sided tools, but this will also add weight to the product. Our manufacturing process adds an isostatic pressure across the whole surface and thus we can avoid these issues. The pressure is also very high, about 4 to 8 times higher than traditional methods. Initial research indicates that UHMWPE (Ultra High Molecular Weight Polyethylene) in many cases shows increased ballistic performance, and better mechanical properties, with increased processing pressure compared to typical manufacturing processes. We intend to exploit this in order to get products with a higher ballistic performance at the same weight or lower weight with the same ballistic performance, alternatively we can use lower grade materials to achieve the same weight and performance as existing products. We will also be looking into designing products with altering protection levels across the surface, which is a unique feature for this type of products today.