LAPG NIJ Level IV Edge to Edge Body Armor (LA Police Gear)

Hey everyone, welcome back to the range. My name is Matt. Also known as the king of armor destruction the armor wizard zap zap. We have a body armor demo today because that's why you tuned in. From LA police gear now in full transparency they contacted me and offered to send me a pair of these plates so that I can provide them some solid data on with no strings attached. This is a level four offering single curve edge to edge. Let's take a closer look at these guys and table and see what we're going to do today. Now if you've been on my channel for a little while we've tested the LA police gear plates a while back and through various different types of videos and they are a solid low-end budget level four or level three plate. Typically they employ ceramic strike faces and they have a little foam ring on there so they are a little lighter than average but that's because they have less ceramic. What's different about this particular model is that it has or claims to have edge to edge ceramic strike face on it. So this guy weighs 8.09 pounds or 3.67 kilograms. It is 1.156 inches thick or 29.36 millimeters. This is a 10 by 12 single curve plate and we measured it close to its true size. We've got a little square on there indicating so if you wonder what that's on there for we just added that late 2024. As I mentioned it is single curve so we have one rolling curve right there. Normally with a multi-curve plate you've got another curve here or actually sometimes even two or three curves there. Depending on your body type I find that multi-curve plates fit the best but some people may prefer a single curve depending on their use case. Now if this is the first time you're viewing my YouTube channel here comes the long-winded speech. You can always skip to the action if you don't want to listen to any of this but it is vital information. We're after worst case scenario on my channel so you guys have confidence in this personal protection equipment if you decide to make that buying decision to purchase these. Since this is rifle armor we shoot at 45 feet. We also shoot at zero degrees again because that is worst case scenario. Any oblique angles only add to the amount of material that bullet has to penetrate and could give you false performance aspects. Since this employs a ceramic strike base per the NIJ we've dropped each plate on its face two times as a pre-conditioning test. After we've done that we mark a DT on the plate indicating that we've done so. If we do any more than two times we'll mark that there. We'll also mark TQ if it passed a torque test. Both plates and that's where you take the opposing edges of the plate and you apply force to listen for any cracking. Since I'm assuming this is a tile or a ray plate maybe it's not we'll find out when we do the teardown. We also use a giant clay briefcase filled with chroma plastilene the number one clay from Chivant and that acts as our compressible media and it's like a 90 pound object to set the armor up against because we don't want the armor flying there and about we want to strap it down so again we can get that maximum energy transfer on that plate for worst case scenario. Now the NIJ heats that up to 100 degrees they drop a two and a half inch ball from like six feet or something they measure that dimple and if it's 19 to 22 millimeters in like six spots that clay is certified for accurate representation. Now it's like 50 degrees outside today I don't have an environmental chamber or any way to keep the heat in it so I have it heating in an inglue down there and then once I take it out of there the temperature starts dropping so we're looking at a representation what back face could be. If you see something like 60 millimeters in my clay from a 308 shot or from a 556 shot in the NIJ's clay that likely would be failing. We also use a chronograph whenever possible we have our Pro Chronopal Digital DLX as well as a Garmin Zero C1 we got that from Bass Pro Shops Cabela's back in I think May or June and it's good to have that second data set so that if one of the chronographs fails we have a backup and I use a chronograph because we need to know the velocity of that bullet for level 4. M2 armor piercing has to be going 2880 feet per second and usually do not see that out of surplus ammunition or with 22 or 24 inch barrel guns you need a 26 and that surplus to get very close to that velocity. We also put a spreadsheet here at the beginning in the end we kind of foreshadow all the threats that we're going to shoot at it we mark our penetrations and our velocities in the end and we do a tear down to see what the guts are going to look like and to confirm that this is an edge to edge strike base typically what I do with a lot of plates I get them in if they don't have an edge to edge strike base I'll stab the outside of the edge with an exacto knife try to find out what that edge is so doing that tear down is a confirmation. I do want to remind everyone that I am not an NIJ lab so if you see a threat stopped or penetrated over here you should always defer to the manufacturer or reseller to produce accredited and recent and frequent lab results showing that these plates are capable of stopping the threats that they're rated for and on the flip side if you're the manufacturer and you see me stop a threat you should send it off to a lab and have that added as a special threat to your panel. Plate one is ready to go and we're going to start right off with the NIJ spec m2 armor piercing this is our 163 165 grain full metal jacket with a hardened steel penetrating core as I mentioned I had to load them in 300 wind mag to get that spec velocity it is colder outside so we're going to be teetering that line but last time I checked these these should be good we're going to take three shots on this plate hopefully our luck is a better versus that HICOM 4S AS4 plate 2891 2865 2876 so those velocities at least by the Garmin are right in line I'm not sure what you guys are seeing over there. Easy enough shots number one two and then three now I can tell right away that we may be borderline construction quality of this plate in terms of adhering our strike face to our backer this is the left hand section right here and it literally just shot out the side and was on the table I was like what the heck is that but they're using alumina so good that they're to the edge but when we're adhering this strike face we need to use more adhesive throughout the entire structure and probably autoclave that place those bets in the comments below the plate is nice and warm oh raggy we had a pass through on the third shot down there but look at the back face there is hardly any deformation on that one I'm not quite sure how that got through down there like I said if we're all the way through the panel then you could get spots that don't adhere very well so this back face right here 22 millimeters not too shabby and that first one seven millimeters very very impressive now I'll have to be careful on how I shoot the rest of this plate but we'll throw the 556 at this to see what the limit is this is where we get to play with a little bit of that multi-hit capability generally speaking level four even under the new RF3 standard there's either one shot three shot and I think up to six shots but four of those are at zero degrees and then two of those are at 30 to 330 degrees but we've got our 22 inch TC compass so this is maximum velocity in 556 NATO until we load those in 22 creedmoor but we've got our m193 that's known for popping steel plates and some ceramics we've got our m855a1 that's our 62 grain EPR around the U.S. Army's current issue all the way down to basic 62 grains copper core hardened steel penetrator and our standard m855 ss109 33 32 33 07 to the right below that last shot 33 07 now the m855 30 11 30 25 now our m855a1 31 41 31 19 31 30 31 15 a lot of carnage on this plate I like that we've got some kind of Kevlar aramid material on the front or either a laminating layer but it's not doing a very good job but our m193 shots number one two and then three then our m855 number one and then number two then our a1 was one two three and four place those bets in the comments below this plate is pretty much done at this point oh raggy we have two penetrations from this plate looks like our a1 right there and the that looks like maybe it is just that one shot of a1 right here that is kind of in a compromised area based on the quality of the strike face likely this shot shifted that tile but cool let's move on to plate number two and we get these torn down i say we have a little fun with plate number two this is from ruag or swiss p this is their full metal jacket hard core it's lead core but it has a tungsten penetrator in the front end 28 68 29 13 another tungsten threat this time in 30 caliber this is our swiss p ap this is a 196 grain has a very interesting like egg pointed shape tungsten penetrator in their same penetrator that they use in 260 grain 338 lapua but this one's 196 grain we'll take a shot from the 13 inch if it doesn't go through we'll foreshadow and maybe we'll step up the barrel length a little bit 22 49 okay let's foreshadow a little bit we brought out the 16 inch same threat if you're looking to pick any of this up in 300 winchester magnum or 338 lapua war pig armory has quite a bit of this their discount code totally is not buffman to save a little bit of cheddar on those 23 76 now this is a 196 grain so we're not going to see super warm velocities out of this our test would not be complete without our 300 winchad loads we've got our m14 a1 api mr flashy flash nice and bright flash it should look awesome because it is getting towards dusk and we've got our m80 a1 that is the u.s army's epr round of m80 it's 130 grains copper core hardened steel penetrating tip there is a variance that allows for 49 to like 60 rhc but every time i've checked these they've been on the lower end 49 50 these should be smoking fast out of the 300 win mag here 35 39 the bottom oh ho 33 77 so much fire so satisfying all right ladies and gentlemen our swiss tungsten core 556 number one and number two then our 196 grain from the 13 inch was right there and the 16 inch was right there m80 a1 plus b plus was right there and mr flashy flash was right there look at what that thing does to the plates blew this all to hell if i could say that i'm not sure if there's any spot left on this plate to try any more hits i think because of the quality nature of that we're gonna call it place those bets in the comments below oh raggy we have a pass through from that swiss p ap and the 196 grain but mr flashy flash and the m80a1 were stopped now that back face down there oh she a doozy she a doozy only 33 34 millimeters but it's quite large this guy right here 40 millimeters the clay is still pretty soft but because it's getting colder in the day it's starting to harden up but there you have it folks this is very typical performance from an imported tile array plate again i've said it probably eight times in this video the major downfall to these is the lack of adhesion from that stripe face to that backer the polyethylene seems to be pretty good let's tear this guy down paging dr mattis surgery paging dr mattis surgery now for a fan favorite that's the tear down when we get to look at the guts of the plates and with our ceramic composites we get to look at all the different tidbits that make them up this was plate number two confirmed our only penetration was that swiss p ap from the 16 inch they're using polyethylene and it actually appears to be pressed fairly well that maintained its shape with all of that energy i measured that right around 530 000 now when i talk about that adhesives and lack of uniformity i think that's the word i was trying to say earlier you can see where the glue is and isn't so we need more uniform adhesive and stronger adhesive throughout the entire size of the plate then we need to put that ceramic straight face on there and then autoclave it i know gts armor has talked about his methods for adhering those together to make a better multi-hit capable plate and here's our strike face confirmed that thing does go edge to edge so they've had custom cut tiles to get there now there is just a little bit of foam as you can see right there on the upper edges but we're using alumina we measured those tiles right around 410 000 thick now there is a drop face foam protectant and some aramid fiber on there to kind of act like a laminating layer but again we need more adhesive on this too i measured that right around 120 000 thick for a single curve plate again i don't want to set your budget expectations that's up to you again i can't value your life that is for you to do on your own and generally speaking you should probably spend as much money as you can afford on personal personal protection equipment but these do the job and as long as la police gear is sending them off frequently to have them lot tested for conformity and they do their job they'll probably work and again they're on the lower end of the budget you can certainly save up and buy better quality plates but not too shabby we're stopping our ap threats from this plate at you know contact distance with maximum real world velocity so at range or with shorter barrel lengths these plates are going to stop those threats at least in theory the downside is a true multi-hit capable plate these would likely be limited to you know five to ten hits depending on what those threats are and how close they are to each other let's close this one out because my table is a mess well folks hopefully i don't look too dark in post we're at the end of our day for light i think it is sunset right around 5 20 p.m but i wanted to get this test done fairly impressive la police gear with this level 4 plate alumina again shows that it is good at stopping a wide variety of threats but it has to be on the thicker side and the downside to that is that the plate tends to weigh more this edge to edge single curve plate tip the scales at right around eight pounds that's as much as other normal level four plates like our rma 1155 we stopped a tirade of threats including our 300 windshad plus p plus and some tungsten core threats but the multi-hit capability of this plate tended to be on the low end because of that poor adhesion between that backer and our ceramic strike face i do like that this is edge to edge that they're trying to better their offerings and adding a drop face foam on there to prevent any cracks and act as a laminating layer to keep all that stuff together as long as possible but they should hire some additional r and d and engineering time to ensure that we can bump the quality of this plate up so we have good adhesion between that backer and that ceramic strike base with all that being said it's time for me to get the heck out of here but the end of all my videos i take a moment to thank all those who help make these possible because there's a lot that goes into them number one is my family they are a huge support to the channel they do all kinds of things on the back end that you guys don't see like pushing the button on the camera or helping me take care of the property and sort things or even pulling the trigger from time to time deacon would like to remind you all to like subscribe and share this content so if there are other people who are looking at this personal protection equipment they can have the information they need to make better buying decisions number two are my patreon subscribe star and youtube channel members i have a campsite in the description below there are varying different discount links or affiliate tracking codes in there they cost you nothing they earn me a sales commission and what i do with that is i put it right back in the channel i bought that sig mcx spear from and that cost a pretty penny but now we have that as an additional caliber to do some testing on number three is la police gear again in full transparency sent me those level four plates to destroy with no strings attached i do have an affiliate discount setup with them it is in the description below again i'm not trying to push you towards that sale but if you like what you saw and you've made your buying decision to buy these and you want to say thank you to the channel that's what the link is there for number four is war pig armory a big thank you to them for having that swiss p ap available so that we can do some testing with it to see how good it is compared to m993 i totally don't have a discount code of buffman from them if you're looking to pick anything up and of course number five is you all for watching until next time i'll catch you at the range and now it's dark outside and it's going to be impossible for me to pick all the stuff up goodbye everyone