Military Applications

Gabion reinforcement

Trials have been conducted in conjunction with the British Army to assess the effectiveness and ease of reinforcing existing gabion basket defences with Concrete Cloth (CC). The gabion trials concluded that CC was a rapid means of providing longer term repair and reinforcement to gabion defences, particularly if the geotextile has degraded substantially, significantly increasing their effective life span. The image below shows a multi level gabion wall, reinforced with Concrete Cloth.

Sandbag defences

The British Army is currently using Concrete Cloth to upgrade frontline sandbag defenses in Afghanistan. The cloth has been proven to prevent the degradation of sandbags from incoming fire outgoing muzzle flash and environmental exposure.

A sandbag wall protected by Concrete Cloth easily withstood 900 rounds of 7.62 NATO, fired by a GPMG LR at a range of 100m . The wall showed little damage and negligible loss of fill. An identical unprotected sandbag wall was comprehensively destroyed in the same test. Live fire testing did not succeed in destroying the Concrete Cloth protected wall. Similar field tests conducted by the British Army in Afghanistan led to an order for 5500sqm for use in Forward Operating Bases.

Concrete Cloth can be used by frontline troops to rapidly upgrade any sandbag structure without specialist equipment.

Berm Stablisation.

These before & after photos shows the use of CC4 Concrete Canvas Cloth to stabilise berms around ammo storage sheds. Allows for retention of the slope material while still diverting any blast without spall that would result if shotcrete or similar was used.

Landing surfaces

CC can be anchored down by driving ground anchors directly through its surface. It will contain fuel spills and prevent dust clouding from helicopter rotarwash. A thicker variant of CC can be used to surface runways as the material can withstand the high temperatures from jet engines during take off.

Ditch lining

CC can be unrolled rapidly to form a hardened,water proof concrete ditch. This makes it ideal for camp or FOB infrastructre. It will conform to a range of ditch profiles and curves and requires no specialist plant equipment.