Defense Armor Funding - 2011 Requests

2010 was a fantastic year for defense appropriations for composite companies, in particular, composite armor received substantial funding. Even though it is only April, Senators are beginning to announce their 2011 requests. Senator Jim Bunning of Kentucky announced some of his requests, and looks like 2011 will be another stellar year for composite armor funding. Below are Bunning's related requests:

Project: De-Weighting Military Vehicles through Advanced Composites Manufacturing Technology

Amount Requested: $3,200,000

Recipient: MAG Industrial Automation Systems

Location: Boone County, KY

Description:  This is a research and development project for manufacturing of a machine to produce lighter-weight parts for military vehicles.  The project is a valuable use of taxpayer funds because it advances technology that delivers light-weight materials that improve fuel efficiency, cost savings, and enhanced combat readiness.

Project: Enabling Optimization of Reactive Armor 

Amount Requested: $5,000,000

Recipient: Ensign-Bickford Aerospace and Dynamics

Location: Muhlenberg County, KY

Description: These funds will be used to develop a replacement for current reactive armor used by the Army which will be reduced in weight, meet new threats, and increase overall safety. 

Project:  New Specialty Resins for Advanced Composite Armor

Amount Requested: $2,000,000

Recipient: Hexion Specialty Chemicals, Inc.

Location: Jefferson County, KY

Description: Funds will help develop a new range of matrix resins that address shortcomings in existing composite ballistic armor systems.  Achieving a better balance of properties will advance composite toughness, enhance fire, smoke, and toxicity performance to help our servicemen and women. 

Project: Tactical Mobility Consortium (TMC)

Amount Requested: $8,000,000

Recipient: University of Kentucky Research Foundation and M2 Technologies

Location: Fayette County, KY

Description:  The requested funding will advance years of aggressive research and development with the Marine Corps to deliver a critical force protection capability to the warfighter, allowing our military to provide the technical expertise required to assess the intended and unintended impacts of emerging technologies within the context of expeditionary warfare.  

Hopefully the military is actually requesting this research...

Source and Photo Credit: Senator Jim Bunning

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Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter

The clip above demonstrates why the new Joint Strike Fighter needs to be as lightweight as possible. Carbon fiber is undoubtedly playing a role in reducing the weight. I caught a fascinating NOVA episode on the competition between Lockheed and Boeing in designing the F-35. It goes into a surprising amount of detail of the composite construction and even discusses how Boeing attempted to use a thermoplastic matrix. If you have Netflix, you can watch it instantly for free, or you can get the episode from Amazon below:


I highly recommended anyone interested in aerospace composites or this military program to check it out.

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Wind Turbine Interference on Radar

Wind farm development has seen resistance from a variety of people/groups. Some environmentalists fear the safety of bats and birds caught in the path of the blades. Local residents of potential developments fear blocked views, noise, and even flickering of shadows.

Another concern, is the disruption wind turbines can have on radar. Here is a recent ABC News article discussing the Pentagon's concern that wind farms may disrupt radar systems, and could be a homeland security threat.

If wind turbines stood still, there would be no problem. Modern radar is programed to ignore stationary objects. However, with tip speeds over 200 mph, large wind turbines create a signature that can be reported on radar. Above is an image from the NOAA, the star represents a Doppler radar tower, and the circled area is the disruption from a local wind farm. Looks like a thunder storm is moving in right? According to the NOAA:

"The rotating turbines also impact the velocity base data as you can see from the below image.  This velocity data is used by radar operators and by a variety of algorithms in the radar's data processors to detect certain storm characteristics such as mesocyclones, tornado vortex signatures, and relative storm motion."

With the National Weather Service, there is a concern as a severe weather event such as a flash flood could roll through undetected as it is passed off as wind turbine interference. Here are a couple more interesting images.

Photo Credits: NOAA National Weather Forecast Office Buffalo, NY

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DARPA Composite Armor Development

Some great warfighter technologies come out of the DARPA. Here is a synopsis for the development of composite armor with private company Hardwire.

"In collaboration with the U.S. Army, the Hardwire® DARPA Armor program exploited unique hybrid composite materials in innovative geometries and systems to provide improved military vehicle armor protection at a significantly reduced weight compared to other technologies. This approach to armor design has provided a suite of armor solutions that can be tailored to meet mission and vehicle-specific weight and performance requirements in response to specific and emerging threats. New insights and infrastructure for armor manufacturing has changed hybrid, composite armor production from a labor-intensive, small-quantity process to a quality-controlled, high-throughput operation. The program applied automated high-precision production fabrication technologies to adaptively and rapidly produce panels to specification and at a cost comparable to that of traditional armor. These changes in the composite armor design and production paradigm have made life-saving armor systems available for warfighter vehicles"

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Dyneema in Composite Armor

Dyneema is an ultra high molecular weight polyethylene fiber manufactured by Dutch company DSM Dyneema. The properties of Dyneema, which include high tensile strength, allow it to be one of the best performing reinforcements used in composite armor. Composite armor manufactured with Dyneema is often lighter-weight then other material options; which is why Dyneema is used on military vehicles across the globe.

Here is an interesting interview with Ivo Oerlemans, Marketing Manager Vehicle Protection at DSM Dyneema from defpro.com. It worth the read if you are following the composite armor industry.

Photo Credit ob1left via flicker

Composite Armor Updates

He are some of the of the latest on composite armor:

BAE Systems Security & Survivability announced they will be supplying the composite armor kits for 1,780 new military line haul tractors. More Info

In a separate announcement, BAE signed an agreement with Rock Island Arsenal Joint Manufacturing and Technology Center (RIA), located in Rock Island, Illinois. This government agency will be working with BAE to provide the manufacturing of composite armor. More Info

Here is an interesting article about the M-ATV program and Oshkosh, It seems the military is going to order 10,000 of these vehicles (already have ordered 2,000). All of which will be fit with composite armor from Plasan.

Finally, here is an article about a recent military show in China. The People's Liberation Army showed off UAVs, weapons, and combat vehicles. The article states:

"The Type-99G MBT is the most modern variant of the new Type-98/99 series first seen in the 1999 parade. Improvements include an upgraded turret with detachable and upgradable composite armor, use of explosive reactive armor, plus improved engine and targeting systems."

I wonder what type of composite materials China is using?

Photo Credit: Army.mil via flicker

Composite Armor Manufacturing

Here is an interesting article about a North Dakota armor/material/composite company, Sioux Manufacturing Corp. They are recovering from a recent law suit, and pushing forward to try and supply the government with armor and ballistic composite products.

The company is said to have a 250 sqft manufacturing facility, employ 190-210 people, and have revenues between $25 and $40m.

Interesting enough, I recently stumbled on this new government award to supply 86 ballistic spall liners for a unit cost of $795.01, for a contract value at $68,370.86...

Photo credit: Army.mil via flicker

UAVs and Composite Materials

In the latest cover story in Popular Science Magazine, an interesting article is dedicated to drones used by the Air Force and the training of the pilots. From this article, the following were the most interesting quotes:

"At this moment, dozens of armed drones circle miles above insurgents, watching everything in real time, with resolution sharp enough to read a license plate"

"More than a third of the 200 Predators delivered to date have crashed catastrophically, due to both aircraft malfunction and human error."

This timely article is coinciding with the largest Unmanned Aerial Vehicle conference currently going on in DC, The AUVSI's Unmanned Systems. At this trade show, demonstrations of UAVs are going on, with the largest advancements being: surveillance/communication equipment, advanced propulsion, and advanced aerostructures/increased payloads.

Composite materials are playing a crucial role in the bodies and wings of these vehicles, particularly autoclaved carbon components. Weight must continue to drop thus allowing these aircraft's to carry more equipment / weapons, and stay in the air longer.

As this relatively young industry continues to mature, advances in composite tooling, out of autoclave production, and new composite materials will help transform the next generation UAVs and drones.

Other interesting recent articles:
Xconomy
NY Times

Photo Credit: Army.mil via flicker

Composite Armor Companies Get More Funding

Composite armor companies are making some recent headlines for receiving substantial funding support. This includes the following:

Armor Dynamics, out of Kingston, NY is set to receive $2 million from the fiscal year 2010 defense appropriations bill to develop advanced composite armor. You can read the announcement here and another one here.

In same 2010 defense bill, PPG Industries is set to receive $2 million in composite armor development. Press release here.

Additionally, CPS Technologies Corporation announced it has received an award of $1,473,509 from the Army Research Laboratory to continue the development of manufacturing technologies for large modules hybrid metal matrix composite armor. Read the press release here.

Not to mention the $3.3 million slated to AGY for ballistic fiber which was mentioned before here.

As long as troops are in conflict, force protection will be mandatory. Here is an interesting blog post about composite armor in the MRAP vehicle and the JLTV. The JLTV, Joint Light Tactical Vehicle, which is in development by some of the largest military contractors and will hopefully be the replacement for the older Hummer-type military vehicles.

Photo Credit: Army.mil via flicker