A highway guardrail is a kind of safety barrier that protects riders from getting involved in serious injuries. Guardrails are also erected in the center of the roads to avoid cars going in opposite directions from colliding with each other. The main purpose of a highway guardrail is to protect vehicles from hitting roadside trees and signboards or from the danger of steep hills beside the highway.
Safety while driving on a highway is everyone’s number one priority. But many things are unpredictable while driving. Things can go very wrong and you may find yourself in a life-threatening situation. Thanks to guardrails many would be tragic accidents have been deflected.
Why are guardrails needed?
A guardrail's primary function, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation/Federal Highway Administration, is a safety barrier to protect a driver who has veered off the road.
Most people overlook the guardrails while driving, but in reality, every guardrail is placed after due calculation of certain factors.
A guardrail is designed in such a way that hitting the guardrail is less dangerous than hitting the actual obstacle. Often, transportation engineers try to place as few guardrails as they can. While guardrails can be retrofitted onto existing highways, engineers can help with the design of more recent roads to reduce roadside obstructions. The requirement for guardrails could be eliminated by filling up a ravine or ditch or by aligning a road on a straighter curve.
Nonetheless, some rules must be followed when guardrails are employed. The Midwest Guardrail System(MGS) is the current benchmark. The necessity to accept larger, heavier trucks led to the creation of this relatively recent standard in the early 2000s. To be high enough to contain most trucks while remaining low enough to still accommodate motorbikes and smaller vehicles, MGS guardrails are built to be slightly taller (31 inches compared to the former 2734-inch requirement).
Working of guardrails
Guardrails are placed to absorb the impact of or divert the wayward vehicles, but it is not as easy as placing a piece of metal. The placing of the guardrail is an entire system that includes the guardrail, the posts, the soil in which the posts are driven, the connection of the guardrail to the posts, the end terminals, and the anchoring system at the end terminals. The two ingredients that determine how well a guardrail will perform upon collision are the end terminal and the guardrail face.
Guardrail face: The face’s sole purpose is to avert the vehicle back onto the main road. The face extends along the roadway from one end terminal to another.
End terminal: Each end terminal needs to be modified to either deflect or absorb energy upon collision. An end terminal is intended to slide down the guardrail if it is struck head-on, flattening and deflecting it away from the vehicle until the latter comes to a halt. The guardrail may partially protrude from the impact head if it strikes at an angle, acting as a gate that opens to let the vehicle pass behind it.
Engineering competency needed
Before a guardrail system is built along a road, it is always put through performance tests. In a controlled setting, crash tests are used to evaluate the system's performance.
The guardrail face test is performed to evaluate if the car will be forced back onto the road.
The vehicle is next driven onto the rail directly and at an angle to perform the end treatment tests. If the system is effectively absorbing energy from a vehicle will be determined by this.
It is crucial to realize that because guardrail systems are typically tested at speeds of around 60 mph, the system might not work effectively if a vehicle impacts it at a speed higher than that.
Guardrails play a pivotal role in ensuring the safety of vehicles on highways. They are placed in such a way that they absorb the impact of the crash and divert the vehicle back on the road. Do you need assistance with a construction project? Vgsteel is the prime supplier of highway guardrails in Malaysia which are built as per the latest quality standards. Contact us for the supply of prime quality guardrails.
.jpg)
0 Comments