VPAM - QUALITY STANDARDS EN ISO/IEC 17025
The four ballistic protection classes described in this post are categorized in accordance with VPAM-EN ISO/IEC 17025 body armour quality and threat-level standards. Whether a ballistic product qualifies for one protection class over another depends on the type and velocity of the projectile it can withstand.
The most common protection classes are: VPAM3, VPAM6, VPAM7, and VPAM9.
The performance standards for protective vests help users understand how much protection they can expect from the vest they want to wear.
Protection is always related to the protection level, price, comfort (weight, thickness, shape, soft-ballistics flexibility), and other requirements of the customer. Users of bullet-resistant vests are tasked with finding for themselves within those parameters the optimal balance (i.e. thickness versus flexibility, the price versus performance, and other considerations—all of which must be adjusted depending on the protection class at issue).
