How Do You Know If You are Choosing
the Right Soft Body Armor (Bulletproof Vests)?

Like every product niche in existence, the soft body armor (aka bulletproof vests) industry will try to tell you that their particular soft body armor and tactical vests are the best. You can go from vendor to vendor and they all start by telling you how their bulletproof vest is the best. Few start by telling you how to pick your soft body armor of bulletproof vest in a way that makes sense.

Of course, the purpose of all soft body armor, tactical vests, and bulletproof vests is to provide enhanced survivability in what would be considered mortal combat or high death potential environments were bullets, knives and explosives are the main death threat.

All users of soft body armor, hard body armor, and tactical vests know that there really is no bulletproof vest. There are a number of materials, mostly Kevlar based and of various weights and density that provide “bulletproof” protection. By adding plates (thus weight), the level of protection for any tactical vest can be improved.

When choosing your vest, you want to first consider level of protection required. You can review these in earlier posts. These levels for soft body armor and tactical vests are well established by the National Institute of Justice (NIJ).

You determine the level needed by analyzing the threat. For instance, a prison employee is most likely to face a sharp or blunt object threat, not a firearms threat. This doesn’t exclude a firearms threat, but makes the primary consideration knife and spike related injuries.

Other forces, such as the Army or Marine Corps, face primarily high velocity, penetrating, armor piercing, and explosive shrapnel threats. It does not exclude knife and spike threats for close quarter combat.

But, as you can see, your starting point for choosing the proper level of protection is significantly different. Use the NIJ standards as your starting point. If you use upfront cost as your starting point, I can almost guarantee you will choose the wrong soft body armor (bulletproof vests) or tactical vest.

In the next issue, we will look at another aspect of choosing the best soft body armor for your protection.

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- Daniel Gonzalez
- Wayne Sharer

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