Material to put in walls to reduce penetration

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Fryerpower

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I searched and could not find a thread on this. What could be put in between the sheets of dry wall that make up the interior of my house to reduce the probability of .223 type ammo from penetrating? I'm looking for something that you could flow into place and then allow to set up or harden in the walls.

Cement is probably WAY too heavy. I don't see minimal expanding foam really doing much to stop a round.

I probably have 3/8 inch drywall on both sides of standard 2x4 on 16 inch center walls right now.

On a side note, I would love it if whatever was done also reduced everyday noise. :)

Any ideas?

I think I have some scrap drywall in the shed. Maybe I'll make a sample wall and fill it with minimal expanding foam just to see how it does.
http://www.amazon.com/Red-Devil-091...947596&sr=8-1&keywords=minimal+expanding+foam

Ooh! Home made ballistic foam! :rolleyes:

http://www.wakeworld.com/MB/Discus/messages/559019/647544.html?1227963872

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballistic_foam


Jim
 
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Use lead. As a bonus, it will also insulate and block harmful gamma radiation.
 
Nothing that I can think of that wouldn't be so heavy like sand it would blow the sheetrock off the walls just from the weight & outward pressure on the walls.

I do know expanding foam will not help any.

Ground up tire rubber might help a little, but not enough to make much difference.
And it would be a hell of a fire hazard if it ever caught on fire inside the wall.

rc
 
Yep, I'm really not expecting to find anything that will work, but you can never tell what will come up when a diverse group of people get together and toss out ideas.

Jim
 
You almost certainly have 1/2" drywall on your walls, not 3/8".

Be VERY careful pouring anything into the wall cavities. It is surprisingly easy to blow the drywall right off the walls from just a little weight and/or pressure.

This does not sound like an exercise likely to meet with success.

If you want a very localized area of protection there are ways you could accomplish the effect you want, but they'll require some demo and carpentry to accomplish. If you're thinking of doing a whole house, probably forget it.
 
Kevlar wall hangings! Lol! Like quilts with kevlar sewn in the batting.

Sent from my DROID RAZR
 
Kevlar wall hangings! Lol! Like quilts with kevlar sewn in the batting.

plus 1

OR.. sheets of kevlar tacked up before the sheet rock goes up.. Like they cover the outside of the house with Tyvek (sic) moisture barrier on the outside.
 
Are you wanting soundproofing or bulletproofing. If you're talking everyday noise you can install some sheet lead to fix that. Do you live in a heavy gang area and are concerned about penetration from the outside? or are you turning your livingroom into a range. I don't know if you can purchase such a thing, but is there some kind of kevlar sheeting that can be hung between the studs. As others have stated I can't imagine that something heavy like sand wouldn't push the sheet rock right through the screws.
 
You almost certainly have 1/2" drywall on your walls, not 3/8".
I thought it was 1/4, 3/8, and 1/2 for the three general choices. Maybe it is 3/8, 1/2, and 5/8 for the three choices. 1/2" would be better for sure.

Be VERY careful pouring anything into the wall cavities. It is surprisingly easy to blow the drywall right off the walls from just a little weight and/or pressure.
At this point I am looking at minimally expanding foam with fiberglass filler. The fill and dry/setup period would be the one to worry about. Once it has set up it should be fine. I'll test with fake walls to see if I can get anything to even help in the first place. Then I will start VERY SMALL and try filling one void between a pair of 2x4s in a wall. Clearly some of the early, not in house testing will have to include just how much the foam expands. I see no reason to fill the upstairs walls any higher than 6 feet or so.
This does not sound like an exercise likely to meet with success.
Yep, but isn't that how all ideas start? Failures are nothing more than successful examples of how not to do it.

I guess the next logical question is will .223 go through my internal floors... Much harder problem to fix. 1/2 inch drywall, 1/2 inch particle board, pad and carpet protecting upstairs from down.

Jim
 
Nice neighbor hood, not worried about rounds coming in from the outside. More worried about my rounds accidentially going through a wall into my kids rooms, and someone shooting at me and the round missing and going into the kids rooms. My rounds could very well be in the .223 range. I would not expect that from someone coming in. Most likely handgun rounds.

Retro, not new construction. Internal to the drywall, no wall hangings...

Going down the foam/fiber route for now.

Jim
 
Ballistic Wall

There is no good way to retro fit. Economically the cheapest thing is double layers of dry wall. The down side is it only minimally increases the effectiveness. The best shot is it slows down projectiles to the point they cause less damage when they hit someone/something. I have one room with 2 layers of 5/8” drywall on each side. This was done as a fire stop, but 1 ¼” of dry wall is a fair amount to slow a bullet down.
 
How about a shotgun for home defense instead of a .223? Pick you pellet size accordingly.

1/4" sheet rock is available, just generally for double layers in arches or repair panels. Some building codes require 5/8" rock for fire stops between garages and homes or between duplexes.. I'd hang that..
 
I thought it was 1/4, 3/8, and 1/2 for the three general choices. Maybe it is 3/8, 1/2, and 5/8 for the three choices. 1/2" would be better for sure.
3/8 for ceilings sometimes, 1/2" for walls, 5/8" for fire rating.

At this point I am looking at minimally expanding foam with fiberglass filler. The fill and dry/setup period would be the one to worry about. Once it has set up it should be fine.
Right. An engineer, and father of a friend, blew all the sheetrock off the walls of a room he was working on doing something very similar to this. He thought he'd found a better way to insulate, and it turns out he found a great way to make an enormous mess and do a lot of damage.


Then I will start VERY SMALL and try filling one void between a pair of 2x4s in a wall. Clearly some of the early, not in house testing will have to include just how much the foam expands. I see no reason to fill the upstairs walls any higher than 6 feet or so.
The problem isn't necessarily only of total volume, but the fact that the stuff wants to expand in all directions, and may (will) set up at the most exposed top of the cavity first, while the pressure below tends to increase. If the resistance of the sheetrock becomes less than the resistance of the column of semi-hardened foam above...whoops.

FWIW, I've filled things with foam and shot them. It made no difference AT ALL. None. Nada.

I guess the next logical question is will .223 go through my internal floors... Much harder problem to fix. 1/2 inch drywall, 1/2 inch particle board, pad and carpet protecting upstairs from down.
3/8" (maybe 1/2") drywall, 3/4" OSB subfloor, pad, carpet.

Yes, hard to change that.

...

You know, an easier fix to the walls -- at least in localized areas -- would be to remove a section of sheetrock and stack bricks inside, then close it back up. Pretty likely to stop a stray round or two. Not messy or pressure-inducing like concrete, sand, gravel.

And would be effective, where as foam is going to do absolutely nothing whatsoever to stop a bullet.

Nothing.
 
That looks good, i knew there had to be something like a kevelar type flexable material that you could use. It will get very expensive to do it, and probablly should be installed when the home is being built.
 
Boy, that .223 round going at around 3200 fps is gonna be hard to stop.

There is a bullet called "frangible" which means it disintegrates when it hits something may be part of the answer.

I had a .223 in the past but settled on a 12 ga pump and used:

1st shell #6 or 7 1/2 shot
2nd Shell: #4 shot
Rest: #2 Buckshot

This may be overthinking the situation, but in my case it was what it was.

Right now, I'm using a 12 Ga double barrel with 00 or #2 Buck.
 
About $500 a sheet. Just priced out 80 sheets on a job last week.

That was Level 3 though.
 
the PRICE is rather expensive for panels and they are a technical produce, as in, NOT a DIY project...


Now, to help, a single room, cinder block and wonderboard
better than NOTHING, but....
Also ceramic tile, but a tile is ONLY GOOD FOR ONE SHOT....
 
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