Strength Loss Indicator for Webbing

Webbing is strong, woven material that is used to secure cargo as well as for safety equipment such as seat belts, harnesses, and parachute rigging. Due to its extensive use in Military applications, the strength of the webbing is a key component of equipment design, especially in the case of safety gear that protects soldiers, as lives may be dependent on the strength and proper performance of the webbing. However, webbing inspection methods are mainly limited to visual inspection. This severely limits the assessment of webbing strength that can be made, since webbing is degraded by many unseen factors such as abrasion and exposure to UV radiation. Mechanical testing is costly and requires equipment to be taken out of use, resulting in an undesirable trade-off between costly, destructive testing, premature replacement of the webbing, and or unnecessarily putting personnel in danger. To help with webbing inspection, in this project, TDA will develop a portable, non-destructive analysis device for the inspecting of webbing and determination of its mechanical properties. The capability will be able to be used at the point-of-use, so destruction of webbing and removing fielded equipment from use will not be necessary for assessing the webbings strength.