Talk:Reactive armour

message: I recently saw a Discovery Channel program that featured Electric reactive armor technology.
I think the program was called "Weapons of the 21st Century", or something like that.
In the program, they tested slabs of Electric reactive armor mounted like side skirts on an English Warrior armored vehicle. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warrior_Tracked_Armoured_Vehicles
On the side, they placed an RPG rocket facing directly into the reactive armor.
They detonated RPG rounds 3 times into the armor, and the armor didn't appear damaged, even though the narrator remarked that the armor slabs only had "dents."
If this is so, then the diagram in the article here somewhat appears different since the RPG didn't even penetrate or make a hole. 
Im not gonna change anything in the article here, but it really made me think about its function. Jak722 22:20, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I have personally seen electric reactive armor (also called 'electromagnetic armor') hit by an RPG. The outer layer gets holed by the jet, and dented by the explosion of the charge. The key is what happens to the jet between the two plates; it gets disrupted so that it either doesn't come out the back side or it comes out incoherently. -Amatulic 03:19, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

text: * Oops, forgot to add the ITvibe.com site as a reference. Added it. Also forgot to mention I removed the "This section doesn't cite any references" tag. Hope nobody minds. Plenty of valid references now! Mgmirkin
Have also redirected common alternate terms (electric armor, electromagnetic armor, electric reactive armor, electromagnetic reactive armor) here, as well as alternate spellings of alternate terms (armor and armour). Hope that's all relatively non-controversial. If not, feel free to controvert it & note why. Mgmirkin 06:33, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Electric Reactive Armor 

message: I read about an aircraft carrier, that utilizes this kind of armor.
I don't know it's lemma, but it was an article in the english wikipedia.
92.227.179.176 (talk) 19:46, 21 October 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  reactive armor is already being used 

message: This site: [] has a short video about electric reactive armour.Agre22 (talk) 15:15, 6 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Short video about electric reactive armour

message: OK, so it's 2011 - did Electric Reactive Armour actually happen ?
We have had lots of Snatch Landrovers blown up in Afghanistan, and replaced with something beefier, IIRC. I haven't heard Electric RA mentioned in the last couple of years. I'm tempted to call bullshit on Electric RA and delete the section !
I don't think Wikipedia should be speculating on future developments which may or may not happen.
It seems odd that this section has 7 citations whereas the rest of the article that is established technology only has 2 ! 
"Methinks the lady doth protest too much".
U.S. Military Uses the Force (Wired News)
2002 publication.
:... stops the jets by zapping them with tens of thousands of amps of current. This vaporizes some of the deadly copper jets ...
'Star Trek' shields to protect supertanks (The Guardian)
2002 publication.
:... use powerful magnets to melt and destroy incoming missiles and shells ...
:... using electrical fields ...
:... plating that is more than 2ft thick ...
:... capacitors inside the tank which would send a mighty electrical current surging through the metal coils at the base of the smart armour ...
:... 800 millimetres of steel armour ...
 'Electric armour' vaporises anti-tank grenades and shells
link dead - now 
:... highly-charged capacitor that is connected to two separate metal plates on the tank's exterior ...
:... jet of molten copper penetrates both plates. This makes a connection and thousands of amps vaporises the molten copper ...
MoD Develops 'Electric Armour'
error - it/web blog
removed
New Age Electric Armor - Tough enough to face modern threats
link dead - now (March 2010) 
:... researchers are working  ...
Add-On - Reactive Armor Suits
:... Explosive Reactive armor  ...
not electric !
removed
Advanced Add-on Armor for Light Vehicles
2004
:... Further in the future ... electromagnetic armor, which deforms and reshapes the penetrating rounds or plasma jet ...
:... United Defense expects that the concept could mature in a few years, if adequate funding is made available ...
--195.137.93.171 (talk) 08:56, 28 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Electric Reactive Armour - encyclopedic or Science Fiction ? 

message: For some reason my web connection will only allow me to post a small section - sorry!
I'm not adding these links because I don't think blue-sky research is encyclopedic.
One should bear in mind that stuff that works will remain classified, and unclassified documents will only contain stuff that doesn't work.
There will also be a certain amount of mis-information to baffle the enemy (eg "eat carrots to improve night vision - radar? what radar?")
Some projects will always be used to attract more research funding - they will rarely be abandoned, even when clearly hopeless.
I believe Richard Feynman also used the example of a nuclear aircraft as a boondoggle project that would (obviously to a technical person) always remain in the research phase, and never actually work. See Nuclear aircraft and Convair X-6 !
Googling [Electric armour site:dstl.gov.uk] turns up some interesting stuff - in Annual Reports and Accounts , and a Powerpoint presentation !
The images of the test match the LiveLeaks video
Just to keep up with the UK MoD, the Yanks also trumpeted a successful trial in 2005
:... The EMA package successfully defeated a shaped charge threat during live fire testing Feb. 22 at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland...
Then the Brits bought the company and re-trumpeted the success as their own.
However it remained to be developed as of 19th May 2008 Designed for the requirements of tomorrow delivered today
:future technologies that are not fully developed today, such as: electric armour, fuel cells, electric guns and remote control etc. 
--195.137.93.171 (talk) 11:06, 28 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Electric Reactive Armour - better sources 

message: How much energy is needed?
The Powerpoint says
7.62mm sniper round = 4000 Joules of energy (would move a man at 1mph !)
RPG7 round has 347% of the energy areal density of a 120mm APFSDS
Scaling the areas (120x120)/(7.62x7.62) = 248x
4000J * 248 * 347% = 3440000 J
So, 3 MegaJoules.
The biggest capacitors I know are for Car Audio.
eg http://www.farnell.com/datasheets/314432.pdf
The biggest weigh a kilogram, and store < 10 Joules in almost a litre of volume.
I really have little faith that technology will bring the energy density down by 1000x.
It might be best to move the 'Electric Armour' section from the main topic to its discussion page.
Feel free !
--195.137.93.171 (talk) 12:12, 28 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Electric Reactive armour - energy requirements 

message: The metal jet in a shaped-charge warhead moves extremely rapidly, but it remains a metallic fluid at all times - no plasma is ever formed in the metallic jet itself!  This is the only way in which it can remain dense enough to penetrate armor.  If it were heated to the temperature required to form even a weak plasma, it would try to expand on its own, thus disrupting the shape of the jet and reducing the penetration depth.  See the "HEAT" wiki page for a good discussion of this.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.55.200.20 (talk) 20:24, 21 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  HEAT Rounds Not Very Hot 

message: Wait, the back plate traveling backward is supposed to help mitigate the explosion? How is this acheived? By installing it with spacers and having it explode against the hull? Granted even a few inches would help, but I always thought it was fixed directly to the armor, and the back plate stayed stationary. AnnaGoFast (talk) 06:49, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Back plate? 

message: From what I see in the article and in some web sources with suspiciously similar text, SLERA is presented like it's really a different type of ERA. But are there really any working systems and reliable sources to claim that it's totally real and has its use? I've only found some mentions in media, nothing verifiable. RajatonRakkaus (talk) 11:59, 26 July 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Is SLERA real? 

message: I'm not sure what it is, but I feel as if we need a Military Expert to revise this article. BeeboMan (talk) 23:22, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Expert.