PX-3350 – Blast Mitigation
PAXCON® offers a revolutionary development in blast mitigation with PX-3350.
Known in military and research circles as an Energy Resistant Coating (ERC), the PAXCON coating is flexible, yet stronger than steel. This means that walls outfitted with the unique PX-3350 coating can withstand explosions up to 20 times greater that a normal, uncoated wall. In the event of an explosion, the PAXCON coated walls flex, but stay together.
PX-3350 can be applied to numerous types of structural materials, including wood, steel, plasterboard, concrete, brick, block and more.
To demonstrate this, explosive experts and researchers at New Mexico Institute’s Energetic Materials Research and Testing Center (EMRTC) conducted a series of explosions to confirm the protective capabilities of PAXCON PX-3350.
Two identical concrete structures were built, one left uncoated and one coated with PAXCON PX-3350. Both structures contained an office setting complete with dummy, desk and computer equipment. Then a bomb the equivalent of 200 lbs. of TNT and 5 pounds of C4 was detonated 30 feet from the structure.
“The dummy in the PAXCON protected room was unscathed,” said Alan Perryman, EMRTC’s Research Engineer and Test Specialist. “A little dust kicked up, and the walls flexed and pounded like drums, but everything held up just fine. We at EMRTC are very impressed with the way the PAXCON protected room held up.”
To maximize loss of life, terrorists design bombs to use the building itself as a weapon. Flying building fragments act as shrapnel in these types of blasts. Eighty percent of the injuries and casualties that result from an explosion are caused by this fragmentation.
Since the Khobar Towers bombing in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia in June of 1996, the U.S. Government has been testing elastomeric polymers like PAXCON for blast mitigation.
PAXCON was found to be the only coating, out of 27 tested, to pass all of their bomb blast tests (Air Force Laboratory Force Protection Branch).
PAXCON PX-3350 has been applied and is protecting several buildings around the world, including the U.S. Pentagon, the Federal Court House in NY, the Washington Naval Base and several buildings throughout London.
