U.S. Army and NLA Diagnostics to Test System for Detecting Body Armor Flaws

Charlotte, NC, October 17, 2009 --(PR.com)-- NLA Diagnostics announced today that it has been awarded a contract for onsite testing of the NLA Defender at the U.S. Army Soldier Systems Center in Natick, Mass. The Defender is a portable non-linear acoustic NDI device designed to present a pass/fail assessment of the structural integrity of personal body armor.

An action as simple as dropping ceramic armor plate onto a hard surface can cause ceramic fractures that create internal microstructural damage. If such damage occurs in a critical region in an armor component, it could compromise its ballistic performance and protection capabilities. The NLA Defender is designed for testing armor plate for damage on the battlefield, immediately after transportation, handling, or an incident such as diving for cover or exposure to a shock wave blast. Troops who haven’t had high levels of training will be able to test body armor while it’s being worn. The Defender will also be tested for general maintenance and health monitoring of armor systems during advance equipment preparation.

Since active layers of a ceramic armor component are hidden from view, visual assessment of the condition of the armor is not conclusive. Quick access to non-destructive testing (NDT) verifies whether armor components are effective for their purpose. According to NLA, the Defender surpasses conventional NDT because it does not require several techniques to equally evaluate different parts of ceramic body armor systems. The NLA Diagnostics technology was originally shown to provide excellent damage detection capabilities on aircraft composites.

NLA Diagnostics is a newly-formed, veteran-owned, small business dedicated to developing and commercializing a prototype portable non-linear acoustic NDI device licensed from Theta Technologies, a U.K. company. The U.S. Army Soldier Systems Center (SSC) is the Army’s one-stop Soldier-support organization. SSC is responsible for researching, developing, fielding, and managing food, clothing, shelters, airdrop systems, and Soldier support items with a goal of providing America’s Soldiers with the best equipment in the world.

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