Fun with a ballistic vest!

[pyro3k2]

Some ones vest expired this week at work and since insurance doesn't cover them we took it out to the range just to see how protected this person has been for the past 5 years. Turns out that well actually.
This was a SOFT plate rated at IIa, after the tests this person no long wears IIa (and nor should he the cheap skate ).

Sorry about the bullet holes, I forgot to take pictures of the vest before we put it through it's paces. It's rated to 124gs 9mm and 158gr .357 mag, so in theory it should stop 40cal and 45. Im the kind of person where seeing is believing hence the tests


The most "fun" looking part of the vest the middle portion of this plate doesn't look like anything special so I didn't take pictures however, the back side of this plate looks very interesting

I'll get to those larger looking holes later in the review.
This photo is of the lower left side of the vest with some defeated .45acp rounds and some 9mm. Also note that we only fired .45acp at this plate so all the 9mm recovered from this plate penetrated the front plate and was defeated by this one. Still not a good day for the guy wearing this.



more photo's to come

[pyro3k2]

This is the lower right side of the vest with some defeated .45acp JHP, we only shot hollow points into this section of the vest.


This is one defeated 9mm hollow point, remember we only shot 45 in this plate so this is one of the round that penetrated and a hollow point at that.


We started this test out with Ammuntion that the vest itself said it could defeat, being 115gs FMJ 9mm rounds, the vest only defeated 4 of 20 rounds, But one could argue that this is indeed an expired vest, but it was only a few days expired though. So we tested some Hollow points with similar resutls but with slightly higher amount of rounds defeated, but still had a high penetration ratio. These where the 4 9mm rounds that were defeated, also note that these were probably the first rounds into the vest.


These are the 9mm hollow points stopped

[pyro3k2]

These are the .45acp FMJ's stopped, as I thought before we tested most of the 45 rounds were defeated by the body armor, but we would have to pause every few shots to put the re allign the vest, there was a greatly increased transfer of energy that was visible


These are the .45 hollow point stopped by the vest, most did not expand as intended.


These are a few of the interesting hollow points



The initial test being completed, with a large amount of failure to defeat rounds it advertised to stop i.e. 115gr 9mm FMJ's we decided to more on to the next section of the test and just shoot rounds in it to see if they could be stopped. The next round was a 1oz 12ga shotgun slug which was actually defeated!


more to come

[pyro3k2]

I was very supprised to see it stop the slug, so I busted out my .450 bushmaster and unloaded 10 rounds at 50 yards. The vest did not defeat any of the rounds all 10 were full penetration of the front and rear soft plates. These are rifle rounds being shot at a pistol grade plate, I just wanted to see what would happen if anything


Next was 3 rounds of .308 tap ammo the 168gr type at 50 yards all three round penetrated the front and rear plated as I expected


This was what the vest looked like after I spent and hour digging through it and pulling out all the rounds layer by layer


In conclusion I do not believe level IIa would be a good level of protection to go with. I would spring for IIIa at minimum with rifle plates if desired. The vest could take a1-2 hits before the next one would penetrate, I dont recall any instence where the bad gun only fired 1-2 rounds. But to be fair those 1-2 rounds could save your life! It does beat the hell out of wearing nothing at all, but if you wear your armor 90% of the time while you are at work, if I where you i'd spend the extra money on the IIIa or better since statistically you have a better chance of using your vest than you do your firearm.

Still a very fun test none the less, surprised me with some of the rounds it stopped, by the way unles otherwise stated all shots were taken at 7 yards, including the 12ga slug.

[CA Gun Laws Suck]

Nice review! I am suprised on the lack of expansion on the .45acp.

[leelaw]

What job do you have?

[pyro3k2]

Nice review! I am suprised on the lack of expansion on the .45acp.

Yeah so was I, I was expecting atleast some expansion.

[pyro3k2]

What job do you have?

Armed Security

[chefdude]

great review!!

[socalshooting]

How were you hanging up these vests to shoot? Were they free floating on target hangers?

[RedDawn]

Thanks for the review. That definitely gives me food for thought.

[jdewolf]

I'm not surprised by the 12ga slug at all. However I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end. I can only imagine how much kinetic energy transfer would go into your body. My ribs f'n hurt just thinking about it. That would truly be a movie style knock you on your *** type impact.

Regardless pretty damn cool

[xibunkrlilkidsx]

I'm not surprised by the 12ga slug at all. However I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end. I can only imagine how much kinetic energy transfer would go into your body. My ribs f'n hurt just thinking about it. That would truly be a movie style knock you on your *** type impact.

Regardless pretty damn cool

yep. im sure it would easily break a rib or two.


fun day at the range nonetheless.

[Jonathan Doe]

The true test of the efficiency of the vest needs to be tested against ballistic gelatin or BIG piece of meat. But, your test shows what the limitation of the vest is. Good job.

[cyclenut]

Awesome review. Thanks for the cool eye candy. My buddy is training to be an LEO. I'll fwd him this link.