The present invention relates to armored clothing in general, such as armored garments which cover the wearer's arms, and are readily attached and detached from vests.
When a police officer enters a hallway or room, the first part of his body that may become exposed is the forearm and shoulder. Without protection in this area, gunshot injuries are a serious risk. Separate armor components for most body extremities are known, but it can be a time consuming process to individually attach protective elements for each extremity. In many applications, the police officer or soldier will not want to wear full armor throughout the day, yet it is important that the extra armor be readily and speedily attached when the need arises. What is needed is convenient armor that can be attached in little time.
The invention includes armored sleeves that can be selectively integrated with a ballistic vest to form a full ballistic jacket. The garment has two sleeves joined by front and back yolks. The sleeved garment can be attached to a variety of ballistic vests with front and rear attachment assemblies which are removably connected to the yolks by zippers. For ballistic vests with appropriate patches of hook and loop fastener material, the attachment assemblies comprise mating hook and loop fastener material. For ballistic vests with webbing, such as webbing sewn in the U.S. Army's PALS (Pouch Attachment Ladder System) arrangement, the attachment assemblies comprise a panel with connected straps which are extended through loops of the vest webbing, and held in place by fasteners such as buckles and C-shaped retaining elements.
Referring more particularly to
Each sleeve has a shoulder pocket 34 which receives a shoulder ballistic armor element (not shown), and a forearm pocket 36 which receives a forearm ballistic element (not shown). By “ballistic element” is meant an element of soft or hard armor, configured to resist ballistic projectiles or fragments, namely bullets and shrapnel. A soft armor ballistic element may include assemblies of ballistic fabric such as those formed from DuPont Kevlar® para-aramid synthetic fibers, fibers of Spectra® ultra high molecular weight polyethylene fibers from Honeywell, or other ballistic material. The hard armor ballistic elements may be, for example, fabricated of rigid plates of ceramic, polymer, or metal.
Although capable of being worn by itself, the sleeve assembly 20 is configured to be rapidly and conveniently attached to or removed from a ballistic vest 38. The vest 38 may be provided with various mechanisms for receiving attachments and accessories. One attachment system employed by US military services is the U.S. Army's PALS (Pouch Attachment Ladder System) arrangement. This system can be provided on a belt or a vest, and employs horizontal rows of 1″ Mil-W-43668 Type III nylon webbing spaced 1″ apart, and attached to a backing fabric panel at 1.5″ intervals. The PALS webbing defines an array of upwardly and downwardly opening loops. Pouches, pockets, holsters, and other accessories may be attached to the loops. Commonly, the PALS system is a component of a supporting vest such as those which are a part of the US Army's MOLLE (MOdular Lightweight Load-carrying Equipment) system.
The vest 38 has a front panel 42 joined to a rear panel 44 by two shoulder straps 46 and two side panels 48. Front and back patches 40 of a first part of a hook and loop fastener, such as the VELCRO® hook and loop fastener made by Velcro Industries B.V., are secured to the upper portions of the vest front panel 42 and the vest rear panel 44. The sleeve assembly 20 has a front attachment assembly 49 which includes a front mounting panel 58 which is releasably connected to the right front yoke segment 29 by a conventional open-end type zipper 52. The zipper 52 has a first part 54 whose tape is secured to one of the front yoke segments, and a second part 56 which is secured, such as by sewing, to the mounting panel 58. The mounting panel 58 has a patch of hook and loop fastener 60 with portions which protrude inwardly towards the vest front panel, for secure engagement thereto. The mounting panel 58 thus secures the front of the sleeve assembly 20 to the front of the vest 38, yet a user may readily break the connection by operating the zipper 52 or by separating the hook and loop fastener. A similar rear attachment assembly 62 is located on the rear of the sleeve assembly 20, and also has a zipper 64 one part of which is sewn to the rear yoke 26, and the other zipper part of which 66 is sewn to a rear mounting panel 68. The rear mounting panel also has a patch of hook and loop fastener material 70 which mates with a receptive patch of hook and loop fastener material facing outwardly from the rear panel of the vest 38.
The zippers 52, 64, allow a single sleeve assembly 20 to be used with a variety of vests by switching out different attachment assemblies. An alternative attachment assembly 72 is shown in
The straps 78 allow the mounting panel to be securely connected to a conventional webbing strip 84, as shown in
It is understood that the invention is not limited to the particular construction and arrangement of parts herein illustrated and described, but embraces all such modified forms thereof as come within the scope of the following claims.
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Entry |
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“HALFJAC ™” p. 9, Crye Precision 2013 Product Guide, 2013. |
Number | Date | Country | |
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20150198422 A1 | Jul 2015 | US |