Liquid armour ‘can stop bullets’
A liquid armour has been shown to stop bullets in tests carried out by UK scientists at BAE systems in Bristol.
The researchers have combined this “shear-thickening” liquid with Kevlar to create a new bullet-proof material.
The company is keeping the chemical formula of the liquid a secret, but it works by absorbing the force of the bullet strike and responding to it by becoming much thicker and more sticky.
The BAE scientists describe it as “bullet-proof custard”.
“It’s very similar to custard in the sense that the molecules lock together when it’s struck,” explained Stewart Penny, business development manager in charge of materials development at the company.
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In the tests, scientists used a large gas gun to fire ball bearing-shaped metal bullets at over 300 metres per second into two test materials – 31 layers of untreated kevlar (pictured left) and 10 layers of kevlar (pictured right) combined with the shear-thickening liquid.
“The Kevlar with the liquid works much faster and the impact isn’t anything like as deep,” he explained.