• Question: Why can diamonds break bullet proof glass?

    Asked by anon-259658 on 22 Sep 2020.
    • Photo: Josh Wolstenholme

      Josh Wolstenholme answered on 22 Sep 2020:

      Diamonds are extremely hard, they are top of the hardness scale (10/10 Mohs hardness if you’re interested) and scratch almost everything. BUT bulletproof glass is made of layers (laminations) of glass and some sort of plastic to increase strength. The plastic reduces the likelihood of the glass shattering/spraying everywhere. So although diamonds might be able to break the first few layers of glass if enough speed/force is applied, not sure if it’d put a hole in it. On a separate note, did you know the hardness of different things can be found by scratching them off one another?

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