BRUNSWICK

A handgun that can double as a cutting or welding torch or a lightweight, flexible material that can stop a bullet without leaving as much as a bruise on the wearer may seem like something out of a James Bond movie, but in reality, they are just a couple of items patented and being developed at TechPlace on Brunswick Landing.

Eric Bleicken of Griffin LLC is a Vietnam veteran and former Navy Underwater Demolition Team member and commercial diver. He’s also an inventor and the driving force behind more than 20 patents with military, defense and industrial applications.

“The first patent I got was when I was back in the teams,” Bleicken said. While he was working special operations in the Navy, he came up with a portable decompression chamber for divers.

Unfortunately, fabric and material limitations at the time were less than ideal for the inflatable chamber and after initial production, the project was scrapped.

“I did also invent a night reconnaissance system back when I was in the teams — I’ve always had this inventive side,” Bleicken said.

After the Navy, Bleicken began a whitewater kayak school in New Hampshire before going into politics, becoming a Reagan appointee to the Defense Advanced Research Agency. A commendation from the former president hangs in Bleicken’s office.

“I initiated the special operations technology program,” Bleicken said, explaining how at the time special operations personnel were living off the leftovers from World War II.

Bleicken said early in his career, he approached the special operations community and asked them to come up with a list identifying their current limitations. He said the program would then be built around solving those problems.

Bleicken’s federal budget went from just more than $4 million to $350 million in about three years as the program took off. The program eventually dissolved into the Special Operations Command with their own research and development and federal budget.

Bleicken said he initiated a program for the first advanced SEAL delivery vehicle — a 65-foot-long submarine. He said scientists working on the program kept tweaking the design, making the craft more complicated and expensive. The submarine was eventually scrapped.

After the submarine concept sank, Bleicken went back to the drawing board, designing a new submarine with a totally different propulsion method — one he was just given a patent on.

Bleicken said that in a conventional propeller, the force to move a craft is generated at the tips of the props. The new submarine utilizes bands that encircle the craft with each band working as the tip of a propeller. The result is more maneuverability and a quieter ride.

Currently, delivery methods for SEALS are all exposed to the water, with personnel in cold water for possibly hours at a time while depleting their oxygen tanks.

Bleicken’s sub will provide a dry environment for special operators that can remain on station for days. He has just received a nondisclosure agreement with the University of Maine to partner on further development.

Examining Bleicken’s office, probably one of the more prominent objects is a handgun on the shelf with an odd orange tip.

With an affixed ceramic barrel and special rounds made of reactive material, the gun can be used as a 5,000- degree cutting or welding torch. With these special “bullets” and tips affixed to a standard sidearm, police and military can cut through locks or hinges to get through doors or even make spot welds. Each thermite burst lasts about three seconds.

Bleicken said the ceramic barrel weighs about half of a steel gun barrel and is three times stronger. What makes it even better as a standard firearm barrel is a 10 percent increase in velocity and 20 percent increase in energy to the target with a conventional bullet.

“It never wears out, so you don’t have to change barrels and most important is it doesn’t absorb any heat,” Bleicken said, making it better for both conventional shooting as well as the new thermite torch rounds.

Stuck to the side of Bleicken’s filing cabinet is a line of what looks like a string of short, orange Lincoln Logs. The cylinders are filled with the same thermite material as the torch bullets.

Bleicken explained they can be used to make a circle to cut a hole in the hull of a ship or wrapped around steel to take down radio towers. The portable torch rope, Bleicken said, would have a number of commercial and military applications.

Similarly, Bleicken has a much larger ring with ports pointing toward the inside where the torch material can be directed to the center. This invention, Bleicken said, will revolutionize the way old oil platforms are dismantled.

Currently, the process involves divers affixing C-4 explosives to the supports so the platform can be removed. This method disrupts the sea floor and causes massive kill-offs of area ocean life. The rings would simply focus a number of super- hot torches that rotate and burn the supports off.

The torches can then be retrieved and refueled for another use. Bleicken said he and his colleagues have a lock on the fuel and delivery devices for these inventions and more are on the way.

Hanging in his office Bleicken shows off a new ballistic material. At first glance, it looks like about a half-inch thick square of old automotive cushion batting. It’s lightweight, flexible and will save you from a .44 magnum at point blank range.

Bleicken says there are different levels of protection, ranging from .357 magnum to .50 caliber — all with no damage to the wearer.

Currently, bullet protection is intended to be worn tightly and a hit will often result in broken ribs and bruising. Bleicken’s material is intended to be worn loose and absorbs all the energy, leaving the wearer unharmed.

“This acts like an energy sponge. It defeats the blunt force trauma,” Bleicken said.

Bleicken displayed a parka where the material could easily slip into the lining. Clothing will be Bleicken’s first market instead of going through the long process of trying to go straight to the military.

“There’s a company called Point Blank down in Pomponio Beach, Florida. They make police vests — they employ over 1,000 people and they’re doing over $100 million a year and this technology is going to eclipse their technology,” Bleicken said.

He said there’s no reason why Maine can’t cash in on this market. In fact, Bleicken’s plan involves bringing scientists and inventors to Brunswick and as concepts become ready for production, to spin off into separate companies — all here in Maine.

The only issue at hand for Bleicken — he sees himself as an inventor, not a businessman. Ideally, Bleicken said he would like someone with the right business acumen to grow the company while he and his colleagues churn out more ideas.