subject: A Basic Guide To Body Armor. [print this page] Different items of body armor are designed to be worn at different times, so you will need to determine whether you will be using your body armor below or over your clothing.
Covert types of body armor are made to be used below clothing. For this reason they are often designed to be as slender and as lightweight as they can be, and are designed to end up being invisible when put on underneath clothing. These kinds of body armor are often made from moisture wicking fabric that will help to keep the individual wearing it cool, and are also normally produced in lighter colours than other kinds of body armor.
Covert body armor is usually used by people that need the fact they're wearing body armor to go undetected. This could be people like close protection officers, undercover agents and door supervisors, since an overt type of body armor wouldn't be suitable for them.
Overt models of body armor are designed to be worn over your clothing, and therefore they tend to be manufactured from tougher materials than covert pieces of body armor. The idea of overt body armor is it is apparent to other people, and due to this fact normal overt body armor covers tend to be black, but there are lots of other colours available. Sometimes overt types of body armor will include high visibility strips, or be made totally from high visibility materials, ensuring that the person wearing them stands out.
Police forces globally use overt types of body armor, as do security companies and also security staff. An overt piece of body armor will act as a deterrent, because it can help identify individuals of authority quickly in a crowd.
Body armor has come to be widely used in the last 25 years, for two key reasons. To begin with, earlier types of body armor were heavy and rigid, but breakthroughs in technology means that the body armor people benefit from today provides high levels of protection, whilst at the same time being light, flexible and comfortable when worn for extended periods of time. The second cause for the rise in body armor use is because, sadly, it's actually starting to be essential in various types of work due to the increased risks that we all have to deal with in modern-day society.
When you have decided if you want a covert or overt type of body armor, it is then vital to decide what protection levels you'll need. When picking a piece of body armor you should take into consideration what types of threats that you might face, simply because different types of body armor will provide protection against different kinds of threats.
A bullet proof vest is the most well recognised type of body armor available. This kind of body armor is built to stop a round by "catching" it in a web of incredibly strong fibres, and prevent it from passing through the jacket itself. They are available in different levels of protection, that will offer the wearer protection from low powered handguns up to high powered Magnums.
Another very popular form of body armor is stab resistant vests. Lots of people assume that if a piece of body armor can stop a bullet it can easily stop a knife, but unfortunately this is simply not the case. The reason is , a knife penetrates material in another way to a bullet, and consequently a normal bullet proof jacket will not protect its wearer from a knife based attack.
Recently spike proof vests have also become available on the body armor marketplace. These kinds of vests offer the person wearing them protection from spiked weapons such as needles and syringes, which will easily slip through the weave within the material of a bullet or stab proof item of body armor.
With such an array of body armor available you should think about which sort is suitable for yourself. If you're being employed in a place with zero gun crime but high amounts of knife violence then it is worthless using an item of body armor that can only protect you against firearms. Likewise a knife proof item of body armor is useless when you are at risk of being shot.
However modern-day forms of body armor can now provide multi-threat protection. In other words they will protect the person wearing them from various kinds of assaults, for instance there is now body armor that's both bullet and stab resistant, as well as bullet, stab and spike resistant varieties.
The most important factor when buying your body armor is to ensure it'll protect you. Be sure you have the suitable kind of protection for the dangers you're likely to face, because you can't put a price on your life.
