Decades ago, I was the responsible engineer on a construction project that included bulletproofing. I learned from one of the'experts' that 5.56 is traveling so fast that it melts its way through solid 2" blocks of both 'bulletproof' glass and polycarbonate. (2" thick glass and polycarbonate slabs) They used multiple layers with a small air gap. The end result was that the 5.56 bullet would shatter against the inner layer and not fully penetrate.

Honey, what your'e doing? Baking body armor my dear!

im glad useful info like this is easily available nowadays , thanks

Another tuber take his and wraps it with a layer of fiberglass and resin. This stops the plastic from expanding and stops most rounds including rifle.And it’s only an inch thick.

Usually manufacturers of UHMWPE or HDPE armor plates use them in a fabric form with the plastic being made into strands and then woven, and the great thing is that fabric is cheap as chips online. It's also better when encased in an epoxy resin to keep it from just moving out of the way since it's a thermoplastic it sorta melts and they helps when it can't just move away

This could be a good way to armor a small safe room on a budget honestly!

U could place a ceramic tile in front and coat the whole thing with spray rhino lining.

Dude, you are the best to watch! Thanks!

Learn from the great candy makers who handcraft retro sweets using Victorian techniques. They work on heated metal surfaces, that they can set with a thermostat. That way they can work at the melting point of the sugar mixture, or slightly lower if they want it to slightly solidify and remain mailable. If you could borrow a heated work surface, and use a metal rolling pin at the same temperature, you could manipulate the plastic much more easily. Not very practical, but I thought I would share. Great video btw

That beard is killing it. GingerKidArmy!!!

Well done. I completely agree with your end analysis. You need to smelt the plastic to a higher viscosity and “fold” it more to get a higher adhesion.

I have been gearing up to do this. A few of things I have been contemplating are... Sandwich a few fiberglass sheets within the plastic block? When I was in high school (62 now) I worked with my future brother-in-law in a metal fabrication shop. Next door was a fiberglass shop. They had what was called a "Chopper Gun". Essentially it sprayed resin and it had another hose that fed in fiberglass. As it sprayed resin the long strands of fiberglass were chopped into short pieces as they emerged. This layered fiberglass in the resin in all random directions. This resulted in a very strong end product. So, my idea is to get some fiberglass and cut it into short strands and mix it in the HDPE. I'm very certain this would be extremely strong. Also a thin piece of metal (good quality hardened Aluminum?) as an outside layer would initiate the start of bullet expansion which would make the bullet wider which will make it have a much wider surface area which will cause the bullet to give up energy faster which should stop the bullet. We must also remember that bullet penetration is not total failure. We must remember that bullet velocity, when high enough, is a big deal as far as temporary wound channel and permanent wound channel, etc. At high velocities (3,000 FPS) the high velocity air that follows a bullet into the wound cavity does a great deal of damage. My point is that your HDPE plate undoubtedly slowed that .223 / 5.56 round by quite a bit. Do you want a bullet hitting you at 3,200 fps or something traveling at 800 fps? I choose 800 fps all day long. It would be cool if someone would take on the project to chronograph the speed just before entrance and just after exiting.

Great tip! Thank you

Fun video. Definitely lots of great ideas

Great work Sir thank you

To keep on theme with your post apocalypse, try floor tiles in the front as a ceramic plate

I’ve messed around with this a bit. My hat is off to you sir!! I’ve also tried the KZfaq channel thing. It’s all a lot of work and I can totally appreciate that video. The camera and your editing is great, I’m really glad you did a good video on this subject I’m very interested in the whole concept of hdpe armor and various parts.

Awesome thanks for the information

Great video

Beautiful work, looking forward to the next version. Would like to point out/bring up annealing the HDPE plastic, the channel 'Tech this out meow' just put out a video that discussed this near the end. Great work!

I would integrate a wire mesh into the composite with ceramic tile backing it wrapped in fiberglass with resin

A quick way to get hdpe that i figured out about when I became a dad is if you're using formula, you absolutely plow through hdpe in the form of large ready-feed bottles, jugs of distilled water and formula containers (the large tubs, not the cardboard cans) and the last 2 are super easy to clean because they only hold water or powdered formula. So if you struggle to get much hdpe, find some parents who are formula feeding and work out a deal. You can probably source the average person's yearly hdpe waste from a few months of a family with a

Exellent video! I like your honesty and that shirt!

You could, take 4 ceramic tiles from home Depot, and glue them with construction adhesive , wrap it with denim.

I bet you could make filament out of this and print the plates then anneal it and spray it...this is a fun project I'ma do something like this too when I have the resources

See if u can use the same amount of plastic but make 10-20 thin sheets....you gave me a good idea for mine 💡

Tip. Put some hot water into the jug and vigorously shake it. The label will peel straight off. Also, cut the bottom of the jug up about 2 inches. Pile all the rest of the bits in there and put it into your sandwich maker (use 2 sheets baking paper), and lean on it. Works a charm. Your plastic was already white when you took it out of the oven, not melted properly at all. Your armor will work better if you wrap it in a few layers of fiberglass.

In my opinion, this method will work fine with regular rounds including 357, 9mm, etc... Try to add welding blankets at the front, rear as well as in between those plastic layers to make it even STRONGER 💪🏻 and can withstand rifle rounds like 5.56 and 7.62... it might work flawlessly 🤞🏻😊

I try this, using any hdpe i found, clean all, use the right temperature, and didnt stop a 9mm nta ammo from cbc, its a regular ammo im brazil, but i guess our hdpe is possibly fucked up, i'm gonna try with more pure pead i can found on huge gallons.... thx man, keep up with the good content!!

Dope the plate with ceramic beads to break up the round and find a better way to melt the plastic and i bet you would get much better results.

That's a neat setup! I've been playing with homemade armor on my channel and having success with porcelain tiles and metal plates. Adding in a high density plastic layer might be just the ticket.

Maybe add a few layers of welding blanket woth tedin between each layer anddo on both dides of your milk jug finished plates to improve strength= protection?

Are you aiming to make a suit of armor out of this? It would be an interesting journey to see. Though it may not be worth your time. Although you could alternate it into your regular project rotation. Keep you and your viewers from burning out in case it turns into a 37 part series or whatever. The folks at dystopia rising would likely eat this up. Hopefully you count some of them among your viewers.

Would make a great layer behind a ceramic plate especially if you could mold it to it. Possibly layer fiberglass fire blanket into the plastic as well. good info

Bro who’s looking at this believing there’s gonna be an apocalypse 😃🤚

As an aside the body armor I see most functional isn't turned into confetti - in fact it's layer upon layer like they're making damascus out of jug sides. I don't think they realise this, but when they then buy a giant SLAB of two inch thick HDPE and blow through it with a 22 and are shocked and amazed no one has yet put two and two together why. I suspect the delamination of all those layers of folded over and over not perfectly bonded layers of HDPE is dissipating the energy without delamination.

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I've done this and what you needed to do was get it in a press while heated to finish the bond and to compress the molecular structure of the plastic that's not one piece that's a whole bunch of pieces stuck together the only way you're going to make it one piece is to heat it to the point in which it is clear drop it into a press with a premade mold basically you hate it all till it's clear and they're paying the same shape is your mold drop it into your mold and take about 13 tons of pressure and apply as much pressure as you can This is where the mold will come in the handy to keep it from Just smashing and coming out the sides then it will work you need to make it one solid piece. Which you should have done is after you had it in the shape you're holding in your hand is you should have had pre-made metal mold and a 13 ton press from Harbor Freight heated the plastic up to the point in which it was clear dropped it into the mold and applied pressure the more the better the harder it will become quite literally smashing the molecules to make the molecular structure so tightly compressed so for lack of a better word rock hard with no voids in the molecules pressed so tightly together it will be as hard as Steel

Great video man very detailed just so you know I don't think it's your idea it was just the execution of it. Depending on what you got in the garage you can make that work with astounding results. I pretty much have everything I need to do it and it sounds pricey but a lot of guys already have the stuff in the garage it just takes a little bit of fabrication and to build a mold that can be used repeatedly over and over again it would be worth it a little bit of money you would need to buy in Steel to make your mold. Because once you do it the first time and it works guarantee you you'll make yourself a good setup and your buddies are going to want one too!

3 add a $1 ceramic plate in the middle from Lowe's and use the milk jug to protect you from fragmentation I would also go with 400 degrees and try to get it back to a complete liquid then let it cool.

Nice work. I didn't see anyone else mention it but you need to get it in the oven with the clamps on and leave it for about a day. You also need to sandwich the material in something so it Can't move out of the way of the bullet for a synergistic effect forcing the bullet to compress the plastic. Also, you need something with mass to slow fast bullets down or to fragment the bullet, which will add weight but can't be helped. Fill up a soup can with 2 inches of your plastic, melted and compressed and hammer the open end closed and you will see what I mean by not allowing the plastic to be pushed out of the way of the bullet.

That's good stuff man! Melting it a little more would probably do you some good as you said. May I suggest a rubber mallet for needing and possibly with the final product before cooling in the form with the clamps, do a re heat to ease any stresses. Seems like this stuff isn't that far off from forging steel as far as the behavior of the material. Doing a reheat on most metal after forging seems to relieve stress. Not a blacksmith, but I know a little about material stress. Hope that helps. Hope to see more stuff like this.

I think a heat press might make this process much easier, also you could make a bunch of thin sheets and then laminate them all together. It seems like that would be more effective at stopping rounds as well, maybe even laminate thin ceramic plates towards the front. Or perhaps get a few Kevlar sheets and laminate them throughout the plate.

You could crank it down, or create a form and vacuum pack it? Thus removing all air pockets and voids.

Have you ever made one of those with fiberglass layers in it as well? Just wondering if anyone has done that.

I bet if you laminate some glass fiber in the hdpe layers you will get something even greater, or add sand and some kind of fiber to the plastic mix, heat it in a tray on a induction cooktop, this way it will melt the whole batch and mix bond well together

Kindness is the most powerful force known to man, thank you for sharing my friend in deed.

I like the idea, even if we don't' make body, we can make other useful plastic products and recycle.

GOOD SHOW! (Helping raise your algorithm)

1. Boil water. 2. Pour water into gallon jug (shampoo bottle, etc) Hold jug in way that boiling water is touching inside part of jug that touches label. Wait a minute. It peels off nice.

Good video. Congrats on the new camera set up. Interesting concept. Did you think about more of a type of composite like adding a fabric to it like a fiberglass. It might help with preventing delamination and give a little more structure to hold together. Keep it up my friend.

What about dissolving the plastic in a solvent - acetone, toluene or xylene, pouring the mixture into a mould and letting the solvent evaporate? You could reinforce everything by placing in the solution some pieces of well dispersed fibreglass.

Nice, I just tested my hemp fiber resin plates that stopped 10mm and below. Want to try next test with ceramic tile mat face pressed into a thick hemp/yucca epoxy core and back face with either an aluminum zinc plate or milk jug plastic. Just used Bondo fiberglass resin first test.

Guy. Eff fiberglass. Try dyneema, Kevlar younger smarter brother. If it was me...plastic, dyneema, plastic, dynemma 90 degrees rotated so the weave is crossing at 90 degrees.. 4 layers of plastic and dyneema. Maybe an air pocket half way thru. I'd love to see that against 556.

maybe if you create a external frame to prevent plastic expansion? almost like wrap it with kevlar? (airbags are made of kevlar and layered out it could work as a added strength

The penetration was achieved from friction and heat. You would need to find a heat resistant plastic which at the same time would require even higher heat to melt down.

I have used cut up milk jugs in the past when putting up a ladder tree stand, or using my metal climbing tree stand to quiet it, everywhere bolts or fasteners was used metal on metal I fashioned washers made from plastic milk jugs and no more agravating squeeks at the wrong time scaring deer away. just cut off the size u need from a jug, i never painted them since they was small anyway n out of site mostly, but u could paint them for better camo to hide your stand better from humans

layer it with fabric like kevlar or carbon fiber and put it in a heated mold so you can compress it in the mold and force out the air. the other concern is how the heat changes the molecular structure. reheating plastic can fuck it up. if you can make an aluminum mold and fill it with layers of carbon fiber and fill it that would help.

Instead of just use milkjugs You could recycle old plastic cutting boards into armor. In europe its mostly paper packaging for milk and juice. So not so much plastic to source other than from old cutting boards

So I did the same thing but mad my plates around 1 inch thick. I rapped one in fiberglass and did one with layers of plastic and fiberglass. The layered plate stopped bigger rounds but delaminated and the rapped one stopped smaller rounds but a lot more before it broke apart.

makes me want to go rob a bank, knowing that ill be safe :-))

Using Kevlar or carbon fiber cloth make the plate so it cat move around as the bullet hits it. Plain fiber glas can stretch slightly allowing for the hdpe to expand so your 55 can squeeze through.

I wonder with thin steel on the outside would get the rifle round to begin to tumble, making it go into the plastic sideways, which would slow the round faster & help the plastic stop the round.

Hit lable with hair dryer first often helps.

HDPE gains strength if you wrap it in fiberglass or another woven material like it. Try wrapping it before placing the vices and pressure on it. Also, refine it more into smaller granulated pieces and cook it a little hotter for longer.

How about a hybrid with a thinner lighter steep plate behind the hdpe? The hdpe can take some of the energy out of the bullet and it can help mitigate splash.. maybe.

A roller mill would have been perfect to squish it out so you could fold it like they do with taffy at confectioneries

If you're making this for bullets, don't melt it into a solid cube. It's strongest when it's in layers.

A vacuum might be more effective at squeezing out the air, something like an autoclave. Also could benefit from fiber reinforcement.

smart use of thermo plastic... what i would do tho is add layers of fiber glass inbetween layers of thermo plastic and use a meat tenderizer to smash the thermo plastic in.

Curious when i was younger i heard it was the layers that help slow the projectile down. Maybe try three barrel parts stacked verses three melted together?

you need more heat and pressure. another cheap thing you could use and put the plastic over it is heavy fiberglass welding blanket making the base then coat the outside with 1/4 inch both sides.

Fill your bottles with hot tap water…don’t get the label wet…pick a corner and pull the label right off. Usually leaves no residue on the bottle.

A special thanks to one of my Patrons: Joshua Robison Thanks for helping make this happen :)

Convoluted process, when you can go down to any hardware store get a piece of steel or aluminium that will do the same job without all the fuss

wonder how it would work as a laminate of fiberglass welding blankets and HDPE or fiberglass panels and HDPE?

hmm maybe a sheet of material that has a close weave then a thin layer off plastic then material then thin layer off metal then layer of plastic then material then plastic then thin metal then plastic then material then plastic then material might do the job all then compressed under heat might be good and work

You could put a ceramic plate in front and resin some kevlar or fiberglass around it

I want to see this with metal plate on front and back of the plastic. Make a mold to pour the plastic into, place metal plate on top and bottom and integrate layers of fiberglass in layers as it's poured? use one of the metal plates to compress it down and use clamps to hold down as it dries.

great video. you mentioned about sacrificing the pan, how about putting another board underneath the pan to keep the clamps from warping the pan?

Try it with grade 5 porcelain floor tile as the strike face and also try forming the plastic under pressure Might come close to stopping some rifle rounds. Maybe.

I used this method and I am glad the .22 rounds missed me...but a bb is now stuck in my chest. Just kidding. I built my armor with military grade kevlar, hardened steel plate in the front, layer ceramic tiles in the back, a cup I fused with kevlar and steel, repurposed football shoulder pads, and slices of pool noodles for cushioning. It stops a 7.62x39.

Interesting. Especially since HDPE is like literally everywhere.

You should use a rolling pinn when it's hot and fold thin sheets on itself like samurai swords

Fill your jugs with hot water before you cut into them and let them sit for a bit. The label should come right off. Isopropyl alcohol will deal with any sticky

Hipster level extreme

Watch out for air bubbles. That could really put a hole in your chest. Yeah, this would definitely be a last resort. There's body armor out there that is pretty cheap, and proven to work well, and without plastic shrapnel in the face & neck. Armor that one could afford by working for half the time it takes to make those plastic plates.

it would be really cool if a company recycled all those milk jugs and made cheap affordable 3a body armor. it would be the next revolution in civilian body armor just like how ar500 armor made body armor available to civilians at a low cost

I just watched a guy used 2 actual steal armor plates and clamped them together over the material. Cutting and trimming after.

38 spl is 200 fps slower in almost every bullet weight compared to 9x19mm. The ceramic tile idea for the front would be great, but use the mini individual tiles so it would have multi hit capability, and maybe a sheet of aluminum behind that. You could layer it a good bit, adding a few layers of welders blanket. As far as using milk jugs, etc, you could use a paper shredder once the pieces are cut down. Theyll shred credit cards with ease, surely milk jug material wouldnt be a problem. Id just make sure the shredder was either new and dedicated to your material, or completely free of paper. Outstanding work though, got my wheels turning!! Well done!!

Hell yeah pistol caliber armor is still useful

Place a sheet of ar500 in the middle or so scrap metal laying around in a time as you are talking about ar500 not readably available but look for kevlar type fiber's to mix in

Try laminating sheets of fiberglass or kevlar between layers of the milk container plastic.

Maybe if you used a few layers of fiber glass with resin and cover the plastic it could have stopped the .223 ?

Will stop hollowpoint but not fmj. hope you use a 6 inc barrel for revolver?

Next time try adding some steel screen in between layers to build up anti rifle damage.

ive been wanting to make full body stab/bludgeon proof armor out of hdpe.

Maybe layering fiberglass in between the layers would help?

So what happens if you put fiber glass layers inside of it. maybe a sandwhich.

Use a heat gun to remove the sticker label on the jug. Warm it up and it will peel off easy