Captain America Shield, plausible?

[the0thermrt]

maraging steel is quite tough, and light for it's modulus. it's used in some firing pins, cold forging dies, and as a structural "skin" on rocket boosters.

[postal]

How about a back pack instead?

Google bullet proof back pack. It's kevlar lined.

[RobertMW]

Doing a forever indestructible shield no absolutely not. I'm pretty sure that even those shields that SWAT would use are only about as good as level III body armor, so powerful handgun rounds at best. They have rifle grade models now that are on castor wheels for the teams to push.

Your best bet for a single encounter survival of heavy rifle caliber would be an amalgum of the SWAT carry shield and ceramic armor like DragonSkin. It would be heavier than the basic kevlar shield, but would be able to survive rifle hits, although it would be of reduced effectiveness once hit, due to the ceramic shattering when absorbing the bullets energy.

[lgm118icbm]

Sounds like we need to hire Tory, Grant and Kari to do some Mythbusting.

[captain america]

There is only 1 shield like mine

[M1NM]

How are you going to get rid of that 1000 ft lb of energy that you're hit with? Everytime you see someone take a hit in the vest it puts them on their butt. It'd probably break your arm if you were holding it.

[Steve1968LS2]

How are you going to get rid of that 1000 ft lb of energy that you're hit with? Everytime you see someone take a hit in the vest it puts them on their butt. It'd probably break your arm if you were holding it.

No.. that's a fallacy..

The bullet hitting you has no more force pushing forward then then it pushed backwards on firing it..

So if the shooter wasn't knocked backwards then the person hit with the bullet isn't "pushed" backwards..

They fall backwards as a reaction to be being shot.. like touching a sharp object or hot surface makes you go in reverse fast.

I can show you lots of vids of guys getting shot wearing vests and hardly even moving much less being knocked back.

[Cody]

LINK

[amgc36]

A 12 inch round 1/2 in thick AR500 plate weighs about 20 pounds. So you can imagine a usable shield that can withstand .308 would basically need wheels if you intend to move it.

Did you notice that Captain America has a nice bullseye target painted on it? Not exactly camouflage.

[mif_slim]

How about 1/4" AR500 and Kevlar woven over?

[Sputnik]

Carbon nanotubes, diamond whiskers? These are in the initial/research phase. I read about a theoretical material, "ring-carbon", that would do the trick to T. None of its very practical here and now.

[Rosereader]

I remember reading about a polymer that is being developed for use as portholes on spacecraft. It's transparent and lightweight, designed to stop micrometeors (the size of a grain of sand, but traveling and thousands of kilometers per hour).

That could very well work. Their are no metals or alloys that would be feasible to carry around that would take hard hits like that. At least, none that have been developed yet.

Study your metallurgy and make it happen!


Also Steve 1968, while the impulse is the same it is over a much smaller area than the stock the shooter is interfacing with, so the impulse is much "sharper". Enough to knock someone off balance.

[JoshuaS]

Informational here: the rating of body armor takes into account not just penetration (a level II will probably stop the bullets a III is rated for at least single impacts), but trauma protection a well.. That is one area kevlar won over purely metal armor.

But with a shield you would not have that same problem. It would be significantly less push back on your arm then if you had fired the gun yourself, and sine it is not in contact with your body, there is no trauma to worry about.

[joker70]

A little off topic but Captain America's sidearm is a 1911. You'd think that with the Super Soldier Serum he'd be carrying a .50 Desert Eagle or a M1919A4?

[TheExiled]

A little off topic but Captain America's sidearm is a 1911. You'd think that with the Super Soldier Serum he'd be carrying a .50 Desert Eagle or a M1919A4?

Hes Captain AMERICA