AR500 armor recall

[BehindBlueI's]

http://www.cpsc.gov/en/Recalls/2016/...-Armor/#remedy

Description

This recall involves AR500 Armor Level III body armor, including chest plates, side plates and ABS panels. The black, steel-core body armor is rated for protection against rifle calibers up to 7.62X51 M80 Ball (.308) at 2,800 feet per second. AR500 Armor is printed on a white label on the back side of the armor. Only AR500 Level III body armor with the manufacture date code of February 2016 and March 2016 are included in the recall.

[DocGKR]

Why does this not surprise me....

[Chance]

Are steel plates as body armor void as a concept, or simply not perfected?

[DpdG]

I am assuming they're referring to the company AR500, not the generic grade of steel?

[TGS]

Why does this not surprise me....

Judging from their prices, I'm guessing they're the Saturday night special of armor......is that true? Can you talk about any ongoing quality or performance issues AR500 has as a company?

[SLG]

I know nothing about this company, but I'm a huge fan of steel rifle plates. 5mm is all I have experience with, but I know of some 4mm that was gtg as well.

Pros: They are thin, not too heavy, and WAY more durable and multi hit friendly than anything else. Cheaper too.

Cons: You have to water cut them, or they suck. They are heavier than the best boron stuff out there. Quite a bit heavier. They also won't stop as high a threat as the better boron stuff.

Short anecdote. My first tour in Afghanistan, I brought a pair of 5mm plates to supplement my Boron stuff. They are pretty awesome for really low pro rifle activities. Anyway, the CIF team I was working with one day started berating me for not knowing anything about armor and that those plates just sucked. "Won't even stop 855." I disagreed, seeing as how a friend and I had put 100 rds of green tip onto a plate at 25 yards. We did it in 2" groups of 25, for a total of 4 separate groups. Center, top and left and right edges, if I remember correctly. Anyway, when my tour was up, I left a plate with the CIF guys and told them to shoot it to their hearts content.

I got an email the next week with an apology. They failed to break it with a variety of stuff, and I think they put a 50 BMG on it just to say they broke it. :-)

Today, there are some awesome metal plates out there for the low profile mission, but if you don't have them (they are very expensive), then good 5mm, water cut plates will get 'er done.

Problem is, how do you know if your plates are good or not? No one I know has any idea how to answer that. :-(

[TGS]

DocGKR, anything?

[TAZ]

Interesting. Looks like they are recalling specific date codes Feb and March. Wonder if AR500 guys got a bad batch of raw materials in? Would like to hear more details and some analysis before dumping on the whole company.

[breakingtime91]

Interesting. Looks like they are recalling specific date codes Feb and March. Wonder if AR500 guys got a bad batch of raw materials in? Would like to hear more details and some analysis before dumping on the whole company.

ar500, in my experience is a great company. I am sure they got word of something amiss and recalled out of caution.

[DocGKR]

Anything about what?

The deficiencies of AR500 steel armor for CONUS LE use are quite well known.

Thin steel armor is best reserved for OCONUS areas where the primary threat is 7.62x39 mm ammo. Typical 5-6 mm AR500 steel armor is perforated by basic 5.56 mm 55 gr FMJ and other higher velocity loads--not exactly rare in the US...

Any failure in processing and heat treating steel can lead to multiple issues. A very large USG LE agency used to issue 5 mm steel plates; they no longer do so once these problems were discovered.



6 mm AR500 steel plate above was shot:

-- 5 of 5 shots of Federal 55 gr XM193 FMJ fired at an ave velocity of 2992 fps from a 16" barrel penetrated the plate and underlying soft armor.
-- 3 of 5 shots of Winchester 55 gr FMJ (USA223R1) fired at an ave velocity of 2904 fps from a 16" barrel penetrated the plate and underlying soft armor; 2 shots were stopped by the plate.
-- 5 of 5 shots of Federal Tactical LE223T1 using the 55 gr TBBC JSP fired at an ave velocity of 2945 fps from a 20" barrel penetrated the plate and underlying soft armor.
-- 5 of 5 shots of Corbon DPX using the Barnes 53 gr all copper JHP fired at an ave velocity of 3004 fps from a 20" barrel penetrated the plate and underlying soft armor.
-- 5 of 5 shots of Corbon DPX using the Barnes 53 gr all copper JHP fired at an ave velocity of 2930 fps from a 16" barrel were stopped by the plate.
-- 3 shots of Winchester 62 gr M855 FMJ fired at an ave velocity of 3054 fps from a 20" barrel were all stopped by the plate.
-- 1 shot of a BH loaded Barnes 70 gr all copper X-bullet fired at a velocity of 2851 fps from a 20" barrel was stopped by the plate.
-- 1 shot of a BH loaded Barnes 70 gr all copper X-bullet fired at a velocity of 2758 fps from a 16" barrel was stopped by the plate.

Note that the Barnes all copper bullets deposit a distinct copper swipe when they hit the plate.

In addition:
-- 1 shot of a .308 Remington loaded Swift Scirocco 150 gr bonded PT fired at a velocity of 2645 fps from an 18" barrel was stopped by the plate.

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5 mm steel plate was shot above:

The first shot of Federal 5.56 mm 55 gr XM193 from a 20" barrel fired into the upper left quadrant of the plate (as viewed looking at plate) was stopped by the plate, unfortunately it caused the top third of the plate to explode and fracture apart. It appeared that any additional shots into the upper section would NOT have been stopped due to the missing plate structure and fracture lines, although the bottom portion of the plate appeared relatively intact. At this point we elected to fire 1 round of .308 Hornady 155 gr AMAX PT with a velocity of 2617 fps from an 18" barrel into the lower right quadrant of the plate--the projectile was stopped, but a substantial portion of the remainder of the plate was severely fractured. There was a bit of intact plate on the lower left quadrant, so a single 9 mm Winchester Ranger Talon 127 gr +P+ JHP (RA9TA) was placed into this area at 1215 fps with no penetration and no additional fracturing of the plate noted.

Again--none of this is new information; this was all extensively discussed circa 2008 or so; why is it suddenly an issue again?