Air Force Academy cadet Hayley Weir has been fiddling with ways to combine Kevlar, carbon fibers, and “shear thickening fluid” (all I know about that last one is that it’s goop that hardens when you hit it). She’s come up with a sandwich that apparently is the business when it comes to calming down kinetic energy impacts. And apparently the stuff is also a case of ‘the slow blade penetrates the shield:’
The team tested 9 mm, .40 Smith & Wesson, and then the .44 Magnum rounds.
[USAF Academy Professor] Burke said the stronger and faster the round, the quicker it was stopped by the material.
In the 9 mm testing, the rounds went through most of the layers but were caught by the fiber backing, Burke said. The larger .40-caliber round was contained in the third layer of Kevlar. The .44 Magnum was caught in the first layer.
Via @DeltaGreenRPG, which isn’t saying that this is ‘shoggoths,’ but they think that it’s totally shoggoths.
Intriguing. I suspect it’s more like sand than shatter-proof glass.
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Backyard Scientist did a proof of concept:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sl0BHueSjvA
So everyone should switch to .45
I can live with that.
Sorry, cannot let this one go:
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“Moods are thing for cattle- and love play- not fighting!”
No reason to: it’s a good book, and the Lynch movie is… well, the last minute was awful, but otherwise good.
Lo these many years ago, we tested the ballistic resistance qualities of an “oobleck” mixture with one (1) USMCR SSG, one (1) AFROTC cadet, and two (2) civilian girlfriends out behind an unused farm outbuilding. I seem to recall that we tested 9mm rounds, but this was many years ago and alcohol might have been involved, so I will not swear to it. Nonetheless, I recall that we were unable to shatter a ceramic mixing bowl protected by the oobleck, so I look forward to seeing the results of this experiment!