A while ago there was a big public relations stink for the Army where it was claimed that there was a significantly better body armor available for US Troops called "Dragonskin" than the US Army Interceptorbody armor then being supplied and that the Army was somehow biased against the Dragonskin armor.
There were Senate investigationsbut seemingly no conclusive results. Most private tests seem to show it’s better, but the Army tests show it failed and there are lots of charges and accusations being thrown back and forth between the Dragonskin armor’s supporters and it’s detractors.
Why is sit so difficult to get clear answer on what should be as straightforward technical performance issue of whether it is better or not?
WAG here, but I’m going to guess that there are differences of opinion as to the weighting given to various performance traits.
If you’re on a USA local PD SWAT team, you’ve got a chance of getting shot by small arms and not a whole lot else.
If you’re deployed in certain middle eastern countries as a peacekeeper, you can certainly draw small arms fire, but you’ve also got exposure to shrapnel from bombs and potentially mortar and related weapons.
How heavy you weight various traits of armor is going to play a heavy role in what is considered ‘best’.
You’ve also got range of motion concerns and weight concerns in the mix…
The reason it seems difficult to get a straight answer is because Murray Neal, the president of the company that makes Dragon Skin has very vocally denounced the Army tests. Despite Neal’s objections the tests conducted by the army subjected the Dragon Skin vests to the same standard test used to evaluate ESAPI plates that are used in the current Interceptor Body Armor, and the results just don’t look good for Dragon Skin. See here for a detailed accounting of the results of the Army test.
When is it ever “straightforward” to evaluate technical performance? There’ll almost always be situations where one design is better, there’ll be situations where another is. Even a clearly inferior product will probably have one scenario where it triumphs. A less-than-clearly inferior product will have several.
And then, you’re down to subjective evaluation of which test is actually important and which one isn’t. And at that point, if you have an agenda, you can lay on the bullshit.
I think the deal here is that the army invented a series of microbenchmarks that don’t at all try to imitate life, but which are pretty good at testing solid ceramic plates for quality. E.g., they fire rounds into the same spot repeatedly. On a ceramic plate, that’s a good indicator of its overall strength and manufacturing quality. Dragonskin wasn’t designed for this artificial scenario. It fails if you shoot a powerful enough bullet twice in the same spot (but if it fails in one spot, it’s still strong in others–unlike ceramic plates). Another microbenchmark is deformation. A ceramic plate just isn’t meant to deform, and if it does the factory screwed up. This standard just doesn’t apply to flexible dragonskin. In both cases the same differences that give dragonskin an advantage can also be used against it.