Thursday 16 October 2008
Test rig ensures safety for tradespeople inside vans
A NEW Zealand van seating and interior manufacturer has designed its own vehicle safety test rig with the help of
Enerpac and its New Zealand distributor
Jonel Hydraulics.
Jackson Hydraulics converts vehicles into specialist versions by installing new seats and interiors. These are used for a range of applications, from conveying workers and tradespeople to wheel-chair bound people.
According to the company, these applications mean the seats and mountings need to be properly engineered to optimise weight, complexity, cost and safety. Particularly, the work needed to be compliant with the New Zealand Safety Standards.
To test this, the hydraulic-driven test rig imposes more than three tonnes of force to the seat structure and seat belt anchoring points.
This load needed to be reached within 0.5 to 1.0 seconds, and maintained for approximately one second.
The test rig consists of a rugged 1.12kW Enerpac ZE4 electric pump coupled to an accumulator through a manifold, and controlled via cartridge valves to deliver a surge of force to the two custom-designed cylinders.
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