Bloke on the left has a surefire helmet torch mount on, they are a great bit of kit 4 LED's in white/blue light and a IR IFF indicator. Far too good to ever be issued!

Originally Posted by kitmonster

Originally Posted by jyoung

Is the new body armour supplied by Solo any good KM?

I never went away but looking from in from the frozen wastelands of Canada (30o actually and glorious sunshine). Gearspotter was taking over as the spy in the UK camp and doing a good job. Having got my feet under a new table I promise to spend more time and become the North American 'spy in the camp'!

Solo does not supply the new body armour, it designed and manufactured (I think) the cover but the frag filler is sourced elsewhere and the plate is completely new. We always new in PECOC that when a good idea came to surface we could not morally hold up its introduction just because we wanted a PECOC big bang issue day; the plate is just such an item.

What do I think about it? The plate is great, worlds best, the frag filler is just a frag filler, top of the line but nothing special; very personally I think it is a much better version of the Osprey cover but its just that, the same as an Osprey cover but with a ton of bells a whistles that add capability and weight (if I had seen it earlier I would have bought shares in Velcro). It’s like a car thats reaching the end of its product life and the manufacture is loading some aircon and a nice paint job to get the last few miles out of it. The next ballistic vest will need to be part of a system that will include training, amended tactics, risk assessments so that as a system our protective components are better than the sum of their parts which is where we are today.

That said Osprey was tired and seeing as the next ballistic vest is about 18 – 24 months away I think the right thing was done brining in the ‘Solo’ vest now.

Would it not be an idea if it was required to make a fully fireproof suit to design it in the same way that companies such as Sparco and Alpinestars make thier racing suits? They are made of nomex and expand slightly in the event of a fire so that the driver doesnt end up looking like he has just go off a bbq. Just a suggestion.

German or Danish desert flecktarn helmet covers?

Originally Posted by homicidal_bob

Would it not be an idea if it was required to make a fully fireproof suit to design it in the same way that companies such as Sparco and Alpinestars make thier racing suits? They are made of nomex and expand slightly in the event of a fire so that the driver doesnt end up looking like he has just go off a bbq. Just a suggestion.

Hmm, yes, I'd really want to wear that whilst spending my day running around in a desert carrying 50kg of kit. We'd have more go down through heatstroke than we'd save from flash injuries.

Originally Posted by Bravo_Zulu

Originally Posted by homicidal_bob

Would it not be an idea if it was required to make a fully fireproof suit to design it in the same way that companies such as Sparco and Alpinestars make thier racing suits? They are made of nomex and expand slightly in the event of a fire so that the driver doesnt end up looking like he has just go off a bbq. Just a suggestion.

Hmm, yes, I'd really want to wear that whilst spending my day running around in a desert carrying 50kg of kit. We'd have more go down through heatstroke than we'd save from flash injuries.

Submariners got Nomex working rig a while ago and it was A very expensive and B the fire resistance washed out after a while. They dont get it no more.

I thought Nos 4's/AWD/the blue or white coveralls were still nomex, or something FR called pro-ban... here were also the white action coveralls for all ranks which were double-layer FR, only cracked out when a shooting war was seriously on the cards... whatever it is it must beat the Falklands-era polyester No 8s in any case I'm pretty sure it can be dhobied without washing out the FR-ness of it all.

Ref FR for the Army rather than the RN, a lot seems to have been done by the Americans to this regard.

In 2006 apparently they banned Under Armour and other synthetics from being worn outside the wire due to the flame hazard, so since then a few companies have come out and developed wicking but FR base layers. Apparently they also have FR cammies and their version of UBACS is FR too.

Having standard cammies and layers which will not melt, drip or support flame might be a decent compromise between having everyone running round Afghan in Fearnought suits as suggested, and having people exposed to the threat of flash and flame.

double post!

Originally Posted by Voltiguer

I thought Nos 4's/AWD/the blue or white coveralls were still nomex, or something FR called pro-ban... here were also the white action coveralls for all ranks which were double-layer FR, only cracked out when a shooting war was seriously on the cards... whatever it is it must beat the Falklands-era polyester No 8s in any case I'm pretty sure it can be dhobied without washing out the FR-ness of it all.

My 4's are made out of a poly/cotton mix (i just checked the label). They are a lot thicker then C95 material however. The amount they fade by after the first few washes is noticable with all the FR suff coming out but its how you wash em i guess. They are still leaps and bounds ahead of the Nilon s**t they used to issue. Can't mind what the Ovies are made out of but it certainly isn't Nomex! Its no different from the normal stuff you get in industry.

Do you mean the Anti-Flash Hoods/Gloves? No thats just a light cotton stuff.

Originally Posted by homicidal_bob

Would it not be an idea if it was required to make a fully fireproof suit to design it in the same way that companies such as Sparco and Alpinestars make thier racing suits? They are made of nomex and expand slightly in the event of a fire so that the driver doesnt end up looking like he has just go off a bbq. Just a suggestion.

A tale from 1970s Northern Ireland, and of dealing with petrol bombs... (I vaguely remember this story from when I was a brat, so feel free to treat it as completely untrustworthy).

There were cries for fireproof suits to protect the poor sods on the baseline, so it was decided to test the effectiveness of the 1970s-vintage combat suit, in all of its lined cotton glory, with and woolly layers and shirts hairy. A combat suit has a pint of petrol poured over it, and is set alight and extinguished with CO2 after thirty seconds (a hopefully realistic period by which your mates should have smothered the flames). The inside of the inside lining hasn't charred. They relight it for another thirty seconds. Still no burn-through - this eventually takes 90 seconds or so, and it's reckoned that the cotton is acting like a wick; the flame is burning away from the suit. The advantage of the F1 suit only comes if you haven't got a mate near you with a fire extinguisher.

IIRC, someone in NITAT(G) did trial the fireproofing of the woolly jumper, by attempting to throw a petrol-bomb overhand while standing in a doorframe. Think about it. Instead, he got to discover that Paderborn hospital had a Europe-leading burns unit, and was lucky to end up with only a few scars to show after an appearance as a human torch...

The FR shite in RN kit comes out after a couple of washes, rendering you a poly cotton guy fawkes. That's why you don't wash your battle ovies and anti flash when scrapping the fuzzy wuzzys to preserve the FR quality

Edited to add: Instinct, you've spelt Matelot wrong, no wonder you're only pretending.