Lightweight ballistic with additional stab protection made of thermally sprayed ceramic and cermet coatings on aramide fabrics

Ceramic and cermet coatings on fiber fabrics used in lightweight protection should enhance their performance in stab protection. Based on thermal spray technologies a coating process for hard material layers even on temperature-sensitive fiber substrates has been developed, so that the coated fabrics retain their flexibility. High-speed and high-rate cermet and ceramic coatings are deposited with simultaneous substrate cooling in order to apply thick, hard, and refractory cermet and oxide ceramic coatings. These coatings can be applied on lightweight aramide fabrics without damaging the fibers. The hard material, aramide composite fabric combines the advantages of aramide fabrics and hard, refractory materials. A fully flexible, highly tenacious and lightweight fabric with a hard and refractory top coating is developed. The penetration of knives and blades through such hard material-coated multilayer fabrics is effectively prevented.