Graphene is a special nanomaterial that has been hotly speculated in recent years. It has a wide range of main uses and is widely related to advanced batteries and the electronics industry. In fact, graphene itself has a special significance in the strength of its material. Since it is a vinyl substance, it can be made into textiles. That is, the lightest and thinnest single-layer or multilayer textile.
Graphite is a pure carbon element, and the atomic connections between carbon elements are very close. Think about why diamond is the hardest natural substance, because the carbon elements in diamond are arranged in an indestructible triangle structure in three-dimensional space.
Anyone who has studied chemistry knows that graphite can be used to synthesize diamond. Artificial diamond has a more orderly arrangement of internal atomic structure, so the strength of artificial diamond is greater than that of natural diamond. Graphene can be regarded as a nano-planar diamond system; it can also be tiled on a large area to make textiles, so its natural strength is very prominent. If the atomic tile of armored steel is made to be the same as graphene, its strength , Only 1/200 of graphene.
In other words, the textile made of graphene is 200 times stronger than armored steel. There is already a composite fabric that can partially replace armored steel. This is the well-known Kevlar textile armor. In fact, the strength of Kevlar is only 5 times that of steel of the same weight. If it is replaced with graphene textile, it is also 40 times stronger than the best Kevlar armor at present; it is both lightweight and anti-ballistic. Kevlar’s weakness is that the strength is very high during the first 4 to 5 years of use, and there is basically no problem with bulletproof and penetration resistance. However, after 4 to 5 years of use, the strength will be greatly reduced due to natural oxidation, and only the strength remains. The next is similar to ordinary chemical fiber.
But graphene is a very stable structure of pure carbon elements, and it hardly fails over time. Therefore, graphene made of bulletproof textile has the advantage of much longer life than Kevlar. So since there are so many benefits, why is graphene armor not fully applied like Kevlar armor?
Hay Think believes that the problem lies in two points:
First, the process of preparing graphene is complicated and the cost is relatively high. Currently, it is mainly used in the electronics and power industry. It has not been used as a protective material on a large scale like Kevlar textile armor.
Second, although graphene is light, it is not easy to process and shape. It needs to be combined with other hard bulletproof materials to achieve good results. Although there is no large-scale rollout, it has been found that application trials have begun on a small number of equipment. For example, on the armed helicopter, it was found to be equipped with a new type of composite armor just outside the engine compartment and on the side of the crew compartment. This composite armor is completely different from the explosive anti-armor on the tank. The installation method is also very different from ordinary flat armor steel. It is considered to be a high-end new composite armor with one or more layers of graphene bulletproof fabric sandwiched between boron carbide high-strength bulletproof sheets. The combined unit weight of this armor is only one-third of the armor plate.
But the bulletproof effect is believed to be more than 5 times that of the same weight of bulletproof steel. It is especially suitable for high-value combat platforms such as armed helicopters that are particularly sensitive to weight and protection capabilities. Since it can be applied to helicopters, it can naturally also be applied to heavy armored infantry.
At present, the personal body armor with the highest configuration for personal use has reached the ability to defend against direct hits by 12.7mm heavy bombs. It is also believed that the main defense part uses the graphene boron carbide heavy board.