Back-to-school must-have: pink bullet-proof backpack

I wish my parental units had loved me enough to leave me unvaccinated :cry: all the cool kids are getting the measles stomps foot & pouts

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Well in my day you just got through life without thinking about what calibre rounds your school bag could withstand, or what sharp object you could repurpose against an assailant, and it never turned out to be an issue.

But thatā€™s Australia for you, weā€™re all so vulnerable to armed assailants that its almost never a problem.

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Aluminium is too low density. Tungsten or depleted uranium (military surplus) hat mauling spikes please

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DU is suspected to cause nasty things when the dust is inhaled from impacts. Tungsten is brittle and shatters.

Kevlar-wrapped lead sheeting? Lead has plenty of problems too, but they seem manageable.

Hit @shaddack with this and youā€™ll have half a dozen potential ideas. :smile:

The probability of being in a place with a bomb is rather low (unless you work in an ammo depot).

But if you worry so much, get your own bomb. Probability of being at the same spot with two bombs is even lower.

Lead doesnā€™t have that many problems. Unless you eat it or get penetrated with it.

DU doesnā€™t form dust unless it burns. It ignites on impact but the energy to ignite it is quite high. Unlikely to occur at common hand in hand command, even on metal to metal impact, especially if the DU is coated with a thick layer of e.g. nickel (which is suggested for corrosion reasons anyway).

Tungsten is brittle but again not that brittle. We deal with movements that are slow as molasses in comparison with the ballistic speeds scenarios where the brittleness of tungsten/DU and the tendency to shatter and ignite of DU would be significant.

Iā€™d go for either, or in worst case lead, as a backing. Then the plate with the spikes, machined from e.g. stainless steel, bonded to front.

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Uh - Depleted Uranium dust will occur when bullets slam into say tank armor. Depleted Uranium doo-dads on a hat wacking a skull isnā€™t going to do much. To the DU.

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Hear that kids? No lead dildos.

It really isnā€™t much of an issue here either. It happens but is incredibly rare. We also donā€™t have to worry much about the wild life killing us - unlike ā€œhome of the most venomous everythingā€.

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But thatā€™s the thing isnā€™t it? The whole threat is so wildly overstated, that thereā€™s this market for Kevlar backpacks. Its crazypants.

Edit: Hey! I just read the last part of your post! Its not that bad here. Where I live its generally too cold for funnel web spiders, its mainly just Red Belly Black and King Brown Snakes. Iā€™ve only seen a few of them :wink:

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The element of surprise - the motion of removing the cap is also much of the motion of whacking them over the head with it. (The hat bill is your ā€œhandleā€, thingie on the back strap is the head of a flail, soft fabric between is the ā€œchainā€.)

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You mean like a bullet-proof duster with lead weights in the bottom seam? :slight_smile:

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Is there such a market though? We have no idea how many theyā€™ve actually sold. Heck, it could be a marketing ploy with no real product at all, (or bespoke to satisfy the FTC if somebody was really dumb enough to buy one.)

Youā€™re not supposed to eat thoseā€¦ Oh, um, on the other handā€¦ Never mindā€¦ Iā€™ll just go over thereā€¦ Or maybe come over hereā€¦ Oh dearā€¦

:smile:

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I sat beside a guy on a flight last year claiming he had the U.S. patent for bullet-proof textbook covers. I canā€™t recall the company name but I think they were based in Oklahoma. As a kid, my texts were wrapped in brown paper.

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I remember my locker being on the other side of the school from my classes and the halls packed shoulder to shoulder. There was no way Iā€™d ever use the damn thing.

[quote=ā€œroomwithaview, post:29, topic:64128ā€]The element of surprise - the motion of removing the cap is also much of the motion of whacking them over the head with it. (The hat bill is your ā€œhandleā€, thingie on the back strap is the head of a flail, soft fabric between is the ā€œchainā€.)[/quote]I guess, but the shape and flexibility of the hat and the leverage you can get with the bill seems suboptimal. At the very least, hitting someone full-on with the spikes (and not hitting oneself with the spikes) seems improbable.

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I found this article, which provides zero support for my assertion, but is pretty entertaining anyway. I have no idea if the market really exists, there certainly seems to be a lot of buzz around this kind of product if its all just a marketing ploy.

In truth, thereā€™s a market for anything!

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When it comes to fear there is a market. Think of all the crap marketed as supposedly healthier - much of it no better, some of it possibly worse for you. Some people are ruled by irrational fears. Like they have to have the $500 car seat they canā€™t really afford because anything less is a death trap.

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back of the hand! Itā€™s ok to touch a manā€™s business if you use the back of the hand!

Are we not doing cadmium anymore?

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