How to improve the performance of bulletproof ceramics?

Although traditional bulletproof ceramics have improved their bulletproof effect through certain toughening, they still have some drawbacks, such as increasing material toughness while sometimes reducing material strength. Moreover, traditional bulletproof ceramics are difficult to withstand continuous impacts, cannot be repaired after impact, are disposable, have high costs, low reliability, and do not have good structural designability.

 In response to these shortcomings, researchers have begun to focus on combining multiple bulletproof materials to form composite bulletproof materials. One of the main research directions for bulletproof composite ceramics at present is to combine high-performance fibers to form ceramic+polymer composite materials. In the field of bulletproof applications, ceramics have sufficient hardness and are generally used as panels, while fibers have high modulus and toughness and can be used as backboards to leverage the advantages of both materials.

The bulletproof performance of ceramic+polymer composite materials is affected by the thickness of each layer of bulletproof materials. By using response surface methodology and finite element analysis method, a ceramic+polymer composite target plate formed by SiC-Al2O3 aramid fibers was obtained. Research shows that when the composite target plate is penetrated by bullets, the ceramic panel dissipates energy through fragmentation and stress wave transmission, while the aramid fibers mainly dissipate energy through fiber tension, extension, and fracture. At the best comprehensive bulletproof, the thicknesses of SiC, Al2O3, and aramid fibers are 4.54mm, 4.50mm, and 7.17mm, respectively. Compared with the original composite rake plate density of 3mm thick silicon carbide ceramics, 5mm thick alumina ceramics, and 15mm thick aramid fibers, the density of the composite rake plate is reduced by 5.4kg/m2, and the bulletproof effect is also significantly improved.