Patent ID: 9170071
Filing Date: 2015-10-27
Classification: B32B,F41H,Y10T

Abstract:
1. An armor system for protection from a ballistic strike by a projectile, the armor system comprising: a plurality of rigid, unfenestrated solid elements maintained by a supporting structure in a flexible planar array, the planer array having a strike side and a back side, the supporting structure including a flexible backer fabric layer bonded by an adhesive matrix to the back side of said planar array, the flexible backer fabric layer being configured to fail in tensile before the projectile has fully penetrated the solid element; each of the solid elements being separable from the planar array upon impact on the solid element by the projectile and consequent tensile failure of the supporting structure; and upon impact by the projectile, separating of the solid element from the planar array, and tensile failure of the supporting structure, each of the solid elements having material properties causing it to remain substantially intact and to combine substantially all of its mass with the mass of the projectile, so that the projectile and the solid element penetrate the failed supporting structure as a combined unit having a reduced velocity and an enlarged impact area of the combined mass of the solid element and projectile, as compared to an impact velocity and impact area of the projectile alone.