Crimp-Imbalanced Protective (CRIMP) Fabrics

This report documents the research that was conducted to explore the unique concept of using crimp imbalance, which is a simple architectural modification achieved during the weaving process, as a potential mechanism to enhance fragmentation and ballistic protection levels of single-ply woven fabrics. It is shown in this report that crimp imbalance 1 can substantially influence the energy absorption levels of single-ply fabrics for select fragment simulating projectile velocities, friction coefficients, and impact angles 2 can be tailored to controllably delay stress-wave propagations among yarn directions and 3 can minimize reflections at the yarn crossover regions. This research, through single-ply numerical models, demonstrated that deviations in crimp contents can have significant effects on energy absorptions and projectile residual velocities in short, optimal levels of crimp imbalance may exist for a specific ballistic threat type.