hiltonhead

From the Bulletproofme body armor website. Seems only restrictions are felons, minors, and face to face sales in Conn.


13. Is it legal for civilians to buy Body Armor?

In general, yes - for law-abiding folks. A felony conviction makes possession of Body Armor illegal under federal law and in many states - see A Survey of State and Federal Law.

We have had civilian clients with many different civilian needs for Body Armor so we understand vests for civilians. Our policy is to only sell to law-abiding adults who have a lawful purpose for Body Armor. (A parent or guardian may buy for a minor with a legitimate need.)

Residents of Connecticut are prohibited from buying Body Armor unless the sale is face to face (or unless the buyer is a police officer, Police Department, or military). See A Survey of State and Federal Law.

We cannot ship to residents of Connecticut
who are not police or military.

Some states are considering new legislation to prohibit or restrict sales of Body Armor to civilians, e.g., New York. If you are in a state that passes such a law, you would be well advised to make your Body Armor purchase now before it becomes much more expensive and inconvenient, if not prohibited altogether


17. Flying?

The issue is: do you want to carry your armor onto the plane yourself to ensure you have it when you arrive (but with possible security hassles) OR do you want to put it in your checked luggage, and avoid possible security screening hassles, but at a higher risk of lost bags, theft in transit, etc., etc.

At the Transportation Security Administration, Body Armor is NOT on the list of prohibited items. But they also say:

"The prohibited and permitted items list is not intended to be all-inclusive and is updated as necessary. To ensure everyone's security the screener may determine that an item not on this chart is prohibited."

So if you want to carry your armor on the plane, we suggest bringing your professional credentials, and getting to the screening checkpoint with plenty of time to spare, just in case the security screeners have a problem with your armor, and request that you check your Body Armor in checked baggage.

Hope this helps.

Have a great day all!

copwriter

Depends on the manufacturer. Some trauma plates are made of ceramic material, rather than metal.

For those of you that don't know what we're talking about: soft body armor vests usually come with a metal or ceramic plate in a pocket more or less over the sternum. The plate is removable. The idea isn't necessarily to give the vest more resistance to bullets, but rather to spread the impact of a bullet over a larger area. If one gets shot in the sternum without a trauma plate, the impact can break the bone and incapacitate the wearer. It's not like it won't hurt if you get shot on the trauma plate, but you can still return fire.

I know several people that wear soft body armor, all the time (and at least one of them has never been a cop). I'm not precisely sure why. Maybe they have lots of enemies. The vests aren't very comfortable. After wearing one for 10-12 hours, I understood why corsets went out of style.

shillard

Completely incorrect.

A "trauma shield" is SOFT material sitting under the kevlar layers of, for example, the IIIA "interceptor" body armour worn by US service personnel.

The kevlar will stop pretty much anything coming out of a shotgun, pistol, sub-machine gun, etc as well as fragments from bombs/ grenades/ mortar rounds. etc. The Kevlar physically entraps the projectile, but does not stop the kinetic energy, which can cause "blunt trauma" injuries to the vest wearer.

The SOFT trauma shield is designed to absorb/ spread that kinetic energy, and thus prevent a stopped bullet bursting your liver or causing your intestines to bleed out.

The HARD PLATES in modern body armour provide increased protection from high-velocity projectiles (typically rifle and machine gun rounds). They do diddly-squat to stop trauma, and wearing a hard plate without a trauma shield can lead to a burst liver or bleeding intestines....

Eg: The US-issue "interceptor" vest won't stop a round from an AK-47 without the plates (well, it might at long range, if you're REALLY lucky), but with the hard-armour plates will allow you to take half a dozen rounds from an AK-47 in the chest at close range, then get back on your feet and shoot the stunned mullet who shot you.

The so-called "cermic" plates in the interceptor vest are actually made of boron-carbide, with a spectrashield backing. They WILL activate most metal detectors.

A soft kevlar vest, complete with SOFT trauma shield, will not.

Bart

I used to think the flak vests issued to us were just that: great for protecting us against fragments from an explosive device, landmine, etc but not very effective against small arms fire. Then I saw a video clip of a soldier in Iraq who was shot by a sniper. The soldier went down, moved a little bit and then stood right back up with his weapon at the ready looking for the sniper. Unfortunately, not much information was available, but I think it's safe to assume that the sniper probably used an AK-47 and that the range was within 100 meters (most combatants lose accuracy due to panic, excitement, fear and other combat factors). Could be wrong, but like I said, there wasn't much supplementary information with the video clip. It was enough to dispel my previous beliefs about the flak vests.

shillard

Depends a GREAT deal on the vest.

The rifle used in the video was a Drugonov 7.62mm sniper rifle.


If you served pre-1999 and were issued with a PASGT vest (the one with two pockets on the front, not full webbing) - your fears were correct. Great for stopping fragmentation, and maybe pistol rounds if you're lucky - but anything from a rifle would zip right through.

The newer interceptor vests (double-over front fastening, with webbing attachments all over the front and lower back) and the great SPEAR vests (side-fastening, issued to special forces) are great. Lighter than ranger or PASGT + ISAPO, greater protection that anything that came before them, and the happy-flap groin panel will even save the family jewels from enemy fire.

What more could you want?

Bart

Thanks for the info. The last time I wore one of those vests was in 1996. Good thing I didn't put too much stock in those flak vests. Certainly would have given me a pretty sour attitude to find out the hard way just how ineffective those vests really were.

copwriter

I beg to differ. Your experience appears to be with military body armor, which is very much different from that worn by U.S. uniformed police officers (the stuff worn by tactical/SWAT types is similar to the military versions). Military body armor is usually worn as the outermost layer, while police body armor is usually worn concealed (for some reason, a lot of Canadian officers wear it on the outside). The ballistic ("bulletproof") fibers in both types are typically Kevlar, Spectra fiber, or Zylon. The latter was recently found to degrade in terms of strength in a couple of years, and a couple of vests made with it failed to stop a bullet that they was rated to shield against (this is the first time that this has happened since soft body armor was introduced in the early 70s). Zylon vests are now being recalled and replaced, and the fiber has been withdrawn from this use.

Zylon vests are much thinner, lighter and more flexible than Kevlar or Spectra, but they're still fairly bulky. It's like wearing several layers of heavy cardboard under your shirt. Unless your upper garments are fairly loose or bulky, it's pretty easy to tell if someone is wearing soft body armor.

The trauma plates do function as I described, and that's not entirely inconsistent with what shillard said. The trauma plates spread the impact over a larger area to minimize injury. They do add some extra protection against higher-velocity rounds like those from rifles, but a rifle bullet to just about any other portion of the vest is potentially fatal to the wearer. The vests are only rated to stop projectiles that will be stopped by the soft Kevlar/Spectra layers.

Composition of the trauma plates vary with the manufacturer. The early models were all metal, but some had a tendency to deflect a round into the wearer's neck and head. Some are still made of metal, but with a different design, some are layered as metal/ceramic/ballistic fiber, and some are all ceramic. As with so many other things, which one is best depends on which salesman you are talking to.

Military body armor is not widely available for sale. Police-type body armor is available from any number of police suppliers, like Gall's and Quartermaster.

Someone made a facetious comment about other bulletproof garments. In fact, there are ballistic groin protectors. They are triangular-shaped pads of ballistic fiber that are stuffed in the front of the pants. I knew several officers that bought these, but all have up wearing them quickly because they were so uncomfortable.

And, so as not to hijack the thread more than it already has been, this will be my last word on the topic.

Lumpy

Sigh! And yet, not even body armor will prevent your getting assaulted by the intrepid TSA Public Spankers and their Godwands...