Ballistic Shield Boltless Viewport Adhesive Mounting
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing ballistic shields with transparent viewports become heavier and bulkier due to the need for bolts and drilled openings to secure the viewport, compromising the ballistic integrity and requiring additional components, which create potential weaknesses.
Innovation Solution
A pocket is molded into the ballistic material panel during manufacturing, allowing the viewport to be secured with adhesive, eliminating the need for bolts and drilled openings, ensuring a continuous ballistic resistant surface.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If bolts and drilled openings are used to secure the viewport, then the viewport is firmly attached to the ballistic panel, but the shield becomes heavier and bulkier with compromised ballistic integrity
Solution Approach 1:
The patent removes the bolts and drilled openings from the shield structure, extracting the harmful elements that compromise ballistic integrity and increase weight. The viewport is secured using adhesive bonding within a recessed pocket, eliminating the need for mechanical fasteners that penetrate the ballistic panel.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces the mechanical fastening system (bolts and drilled holes) with a chemical bonding system (adhesive). The adhesive is applied to the back surface of the viewport and bonds it to the ballistic panel within the pocket, providing secure attachment without compromising the continuous ballistic material.
2Reliability
If bolts and lens cap are used to secure the viewport, then the viewport is firmly attached, but the device complexity increases with additional components
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the lens cap and bolts from the shield assembly, removing unnecessary components that increase complexity. Only the essential elements (viewport, adhesive, and pocket structure) remain, simplifying the overall device while maintaining secure attachment.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent merges the viewport attachment function directly into the pocket structure and ballistic panel. The pocket itself serves as the mounting structure, and the adhesive provides the bonding function, eliminating the need for separate lens cap and bolt components.
3Ease of manufacture
If drilled openings are made to secure the viewport, then the viewport can be attached, but potential points of weakness are created in the ballistic panel
Solution Approach 1:
The patent removes the drilled openings from the ballistic panel, eliminating the points of weakness that would compromise ballistic integrity. The pocket is formed by compressing the ballistic material itself during panel manufacturing, and the viewport is attached within this pocket using adhesive, not by drilling through the panel.
Solution Approach 2:
The pocket is pre-formed in the ballistic panel during the compression manufacturing process, before the viewport is installed. This preliminary action creates the recessed structure that will hold the viewport, eliminating the need for subsequent drilling or cutting operations that would compromise the panel integrity.
Data Source
AI summary
A ballistic shield has a strike face and a body side and includes a ballistic panel and a viewport. Plies of ballistic material are formed together as the ballistic panel. A pocket in the ballistic panel is recessed into the strike face of the panel, and is at least partially defined by a pocket wall that is offset from a main body portion of the ballistic panel in a direction away from the strike face. The pocket wall has an opening forming a viewing area that is circumscribed by a frame section of the pocket wall. A viewport is secured in the pocket with a first section of the viewport overlying the frame section of the pocket wall and a second section of the viewport overlying the viewing area.