August 01, 2006

Life Imitates The Tin Man...

Dale Brown's 1999 novel The Tin Man describes a futuristic armored suit that is designed to remain flexible under normal wear but stiffen when hit by a projectile.

Slashdot is reporting that a company will start selling 'liquid armor' next year. Liquid Armor The New Bulletproof Vest:

kjh1 writes "Armor Holdings Inc. plans to start selling their 'liquid armor' next year. The new armor, originally envisioned to be spread on like peanut butter, is instead sprayed onto Kevlar in ultrathin coats. From the article: 'it's a mix of polyethylene glycol, a polymer found in laxatives and other consumer products, and nanobits of silica, or purified sand. Together they produce a "sheer-thickening liquid" that stiffens instantly into a shield when hit hard by an object. It reverts to its liquid state just as fast when the energy from the projectile dissipates.'"

Spiffy. Incidentally, life also (sorta) imitates Lyndon Hardy's Master of the Five Magics here, since that book had a magical cage whose bars stiffened proportionally to the robustness of the tool used against them (and was eventually defeated by using a magically-dull ceremonial dagger previously thought useless by its owner).

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Posted by Chris at August 1, 2006 11:41 AM

Category: Life Imitates...
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