Innovative High Performance Lightweight Transparent Armor

The continuing terrorist attacks on U.S. forces deployed in Iraq have created an urgent need for lightweight transparent armor with improved ballistic protection capabilities against emerging threats. However, current transparent armor systems for eye and facial protection use polycarbonate, which do not provide sufficient protections to our soldiers. The goal of this Phase II project is to develop a new transparent armors that accomplish more than 100% ballistic improvement over current systems, achieve up to 25% weight reduction, retain optical properties after ballistic or fragment impact, and be cost effective. Frontier has validated its innovative lightweight high-performance transparent armor concept during the Phase I effort, and has demonstrated the potentials for high volume production capability of using the innovative fabrication process. In Phase II Frontier will optimize the fabrication process, upgrade the ballistic performance, and improve the residue optical properties after impact. The success of Frontier’s Phase II effort can lead to an advanced transparent armor technology that delivers lighter weight, better optical properties, higher ballistic resistance and lower cost products to provide the eye and facial protection for our soldiers.