DIY Ballistic Protection: A Step-by-Step Guide

Do you live in a high crime area? Maybe your an avid outdoors man, who shares his/her space with hunters. Maybe you just like interesting "Arts and Crafts" projects. In this article, I will give you step-by-step instructions about making Ballistics Armor. Armor is completely, 50 state, legal, and, unfortunately, is a good idea for people in certain locations.

Things You'll Need

• Lots of sheets of cotton.(Buy it new, or cut up old shirts.)
• Polyester Resin
• Fiberglass Resin
• Scissors
• Something Heavy.(A rock, bowling ball, or iron dumbbell.)

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Instructions

• 1

  Lay 10, 10"x30" sheets of cotton on a hard surface.(Concrete floor, sturdy table, etc.) Flatten them with something heavy, I prefer using a bowling ball. When they are compressed very tightly, saturate with polyester resin, then put 10 more sheets on top of that, and re-flatten them. Repeat this step until your armor is roughly 50 sheets deep, and about 3.5" thick.
  Optional: For added protection, you can add alloy(steel, iron, aluminium) plates between every tenth sheet of cotton, however, this will dramatically increase the weight, and thickness of your finnished armor.

• 2

  Let the stacked, resined sheets dry for 24 hours, in a warm dry location.

• 3

  Wrap the dried stack in a sheet of material. Seal the wrapping materials with super glue.

• 4

  Now, you should have a 4" thick stack of resin hardened fabric(Unless you used metal plates, then it could be much thicker.) Apply 1 coat of Fiberglass resin(Font, back,and sides.), every 3 hours for 9 hours, then, let the plate dry for a further 24 hours.

• 5

  When the plate is completely dry, and has 3 coats of Fiberglass resin, sand the surface down, gently, until it is smooth.

• 6

  Now, all you need is a plate carrier, which I will teach you how to build in my next article.