Protective Equipment-Integrated Automatic Lightweight Safety Restraint System

To address the Army’s need for personal protective equipment-integrated restraints for blast-mitigating seats, Physical Optics Corporation (POC) proposes to develop a new Protective Equipment-Integrated Automatic Lightweight Safety (PALS) Restraint System based on a fully autonomous activation system that is initiated immediately upon the soldier’s sitting in a blast-mitigating seat. The PALS system comprises two main components: the Personal Soldier Mount (PSM) and the Adaptive Vehicle Mount (AVM). The lightweight PSM is mounted securely on the existing personal protective equipment and consists of a low-profile (~0.3 in. thick) array of self-engaging “fingers.” The AVM, which is mounted on the seat, contains a series of parallel Kevlar-based fibers with cable slack controlled by an automatic tensioning system allowing for freedom of movement during transit with immediate locking when an acceleration threshold is reached. A blast-resistant quick-release cable instantly ejects the various arresting cables, thereby allowing for rapid exit from the vehicle. In Phase I, POC will collaborate with our consultant, Advanced Mission Systems (AMS), to design, develop, and test (in an ingress/egress study) a prototype, demonstrating the feasibility of PALS. In Phase II, POC plans to optimize the design for a myriad of combat vehicles and equipment types.