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Flawed Army Test Procedures for Body Armor

I had previously reported that the GAO had found that the Army’s practice of incorrectly rounding down back-face deformations (“BFD”) would have caused two body armor designs that passed First Article Testing to “have failed if the measurements had not been rounded.”   This is just one of many testing anomalies  chronicled in the 110 page GAO report entitled:  Independent Expert Assessment of Army Body Armor Test Results and Procedures Needed Before Fielding.

Not satisfied with the advantage granted ...

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Flawed Body Armor Tests: “Rounding” Measurements

The October, 2009 Government Accountability Office (“GAO”) report to Congress, entitled “Independent Expert Assessment of Army Body Armor Test Results and Procedures Needed Before Fielding,”  confirms deviations from approved US Army testing protocols, “the majority of which seem to make the testing easier to pass and favor the vendors . . .”   One glaring example of this skewed testing in favor of military suppliers are “Rounding” Measurements of Back-face Deformation (“BFD”).

When a test bullet strikes the target ceramic ballistic protective ...

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GAO Report Slams Body Armor Test Procedures

The October, 2009 Government Accountability Office (“GAO”) Report to Congressional Requesters, titled “Independent Expert Assessment of Army Body Armor Test Results and Procedures Needed Before Fielding,” contains this devastating observation:

“Due to these deviations [from approved testing protocols], the majority of which seem to make the testing easier to pass and favor the vendors, we continue to believe that it is necessary to have an independent external expert review the results of First Article Testing and the overall effect ...

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Levin, McCain Request Review of Body Armor Systems

By Roger Charles

President’s Note:

Well, folks, sometimes things move much faster in Washington than experience would lead one to expect. This happened Monday and yesterday (May 21 and 22) when Sen. Carl Levin and Sen. John McCain, Chairman and Ranking Minority Member respectively, of the Senate Armed Services Committee short-circuited the public dispute between the Army acquisition mafia and NBC News about recent NBC reporting (assisted by SFTT and DefenseWatch) that showed Pinnacle Armor’s Dragon Skin performed “significantly better” (the words ...

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