Drop Weight Testing of Samples Made of Different Building Materials Designed for the Protection of Classified Information

Materials (Basel). 2023 Jan 31;16(3):1219. doi: 10.3390/ma16031219.

Abstract

Classified information is information of vital importance to the State, which must be protected against disclosure, misuse, damage, unauthorized reproduction, destruction, loss or theft in the interest of the State. At present, there are four levels of classification. For each classification level, precise requirements are laid down for the material of the walls, partitions and ceilings of the rooms in which classified information is stored. Several types of materials are defined for each classification level. The objective of this study was to test and determine whether the different types of materials proposed for the Confidential level meet the same level of resistance. A drop weight test via pendulum was used to determine the resistance. A 50 kg weight was used to break through a 60 × 100 cm sample. The impact of the weight was on the exact center of the sample. The result of the tests was that to break through samples of different materials, large differences in the drop height of the weight were required. The most resistant was the specimen made of reinforced concrete, which required 3 impacts from a height of 80 cm to break through. On the contrary, the least resistant were the specimens made of masonry of autoclaved aerated concrete, where after 2 falls from a height of 5 cm, the sample broke into 2 parts.

Keywords: classified information; drop weight testing; impact; resistance; wall.

Grants and funding

The article was supported by the University of Žilina, grant 19809/2022, “Assessment of the influence of the mechanical properties of the material on the time of break through resistance”. This research was funded by The Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of the Slovak Republic and Slovak research and development agency grant number APVV-20-0457 Monitoring and Tracing of Movement and Contacts of Persons in Medical Facilities. This research was funded by The Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of the Slovak Republic by project KEGA 031ŽU-4/2022 Creation of original study materials and a university textbook in the field of criminology. This paper was supported by CTU Student Grant Competition project SGS22/050/OHK1/1T/11. This paper was supported by TA ČR Starfos project FW03010141.