Technical notes
What NIJ 0101.06 actually measures
NIJ 0101.06 is the standard buyers name most often, and the one most often described loosely. Here is what it covers, what Level IIIA means, and why we say our fabric is tested to it rather than certified by it.
The standard in one paragraph
NIJ 0101.06 is the United States National Institute of Justice standard for the ballistic resistance of body armor, in its 2008 revision. It does two things. It sets the test rounds and the velocities that armor at each protection level has to face. And it limits how far the armor may deform into a clay backing placed behind the shot, which is the measurement usually called back face signature. A panel can stop a round completely and still fail the standard if it pushes too deep into the clay, because that deformation is what would have been transferred into the wearer.
Level IIIA is the soft armor level
The levels in the standard run from handgun threats up to rifle threats. Level IIIA is the top of the soft, flexible range: it is tested with .44 Magnum SJHP and with 9mm. Everything above IIIA moves into hard armor territory, which is a plate rather than a flexible panel. When a soft armor buyer says "IIIA" without qualifying it further, this is almost always the level meant, and it is the level our soft armor UD fabric reports are written against.
There is an older revision still in circulation. NIJ 0101.04, from 2000, uses lower test velocities than 0101.06 for the same level names. A panel meeting Level IIIA under 0101.04 therefore needs fewer layers than one meeting Level IIIA under 0101.06. The two are not interchangeable, and where our tables quote 0101.04 we say so explicitly rather than let the level name imply the newer revision.
Why we never write "NIJ certified"
NIJ certification applies to finished torso-worn body armor. It does not apply to fabric. There is no mechanism by which a roll of UD cloth can be NIJ certified, so any fabric supplier claiming that is either confused or hoping you are. What a fabric supplier can honestly say is that a specified panel, built from that fabric in a stated configuration, was tested to the standard at a named laboratory, and that the report is available. That is the wording we use everywhere on this site, and the reason we use it.
Our own figures against this standard
These are the configurations we publish for NIJ 0101.06 Level IIIA. Layer counts are for a pressed panel, not for loose fabric, and the para-aramid line is specified by panel areal density rather than by layer count.
Scroll the table sideways to see all columns.
- • Our hardest report against this standard: SB130 at 38 layers, .44 Magnum SJHP 240 grain, six shots, tested at H.P. White Laboratory in the United States in 2010. All shots passed.
- • A test result describes the configuration that was shot. Change the layer count, the resin, the panel size or the temperature and the result changes with it, so ask us for the report that matches your own lay-up.
Full layer count and areal density tables for SB130, SB160 and SB166-225 are on the Soft Armor UD Fabric product page, and the standards library on the About page covers the other standards our reports are written against.