Excel Tribometers, LLC

For Dry and Wet Testing

ASTM F1677 is for the Brungraber Mk II (a/k/a Portable Inclinable Articulated Strut Tribometer or PIAST), which is used for both dry and wet testing.  This standard has been officially withdrawn by ASTM, but it is still available for sale and distribution by ASTM.

ASTM F1679 is for the English XL Variable Incidence Tribometer (VIT), which is used for both dry and wet testing.  This standard has been officially withdrawn by ASTM, but it is still available for sale and distribution by ASTM.

ANSI A1264.2 is for Provision of Slip Resistance in the Workplace, which originated with ANSI and is primarily oriented to workplaces rather than public walkway areas. The standard specifies a threshold of safety of 0.50, and references several of the ASTM F13 standards (including F1679 for the XL VIT) as means of measuring performance and suggests some means of mitigating slippery conditions.

NFPA 1901 Standard for Automotive Fire Apparatus, 15.7.4 (in v2009) recognizes only the VIT and the PIAST for testing wet surfaces.

For Dry Testing Only

ASTM F609 is for the Horizontal Pull Slipmeter (HPS), an early electrically-operated dragsled meter.  The standard does not permit wet testing.  It is important to note that F609 applies only to the HPS and is not applicable to the Model 80, ASM 725 or any other device.

ASTM F1678 is for the Portable Articulated Strut Tribometer (PAST) also known as the Brungraber, Mk I. Because of its sticktion problem, it is not useful for wet testing.  This standard has been officially withdrawn by ASTM, but it is still available for sale and distribution by ASTM.

ASTM C1028 for the Horizontal Pull Dynamometer is for factory quality assurance testing of ceramic tile. It is a 50-pound drag weight that is pulled by a hand-held force meter, and the COF number is calculated using the H/V formula. As with all dragsleds, this tester is not capable of valid wet testing, nor has a satisfactory precision and bias study ever been completed.

ASTM D2047 is for testing floor polishes for slip resistance under laboratory conditions. It involves the James Machine, a leather friction pad, and specifies that all testing must be performed dry. It cannot be used on a floor since it is not portable. There are four iterations of the James Machine, with representations that results are interchangeable, although no precision and bias substantiation has been published.

UL410 is for rating of various materials and surfaces as "slip resistant."  Any material or coating can be listed by Underwriters Laboratories as slip resistant if it achieves an index on 0.50 or higher on a James Machine with a leather pad. This is the original slip resistance standard. Its limitations are similar to D2047.

Other Related Standards

Some codes and standards incorporating the "slip resistant" terminology include ASTM F1637 Practice for Safe Walking and the Uniform Federal Accessibility Standards and Americans with Disability Act Accessibility Guidelines (ADAAG) as well as the regional building codes (BOCA, UBC and Southern, and now the Universal Building code).

NFSI B101.1 is a recent standard developed by the National Floor Safety Institute that presents a ranking system for walkway surfaces based on measurement of “wet static coefficient of friction.”  The NFSI B101.1 standard is a separate stand-alone document that does not replace, negate, supplant, or diminish the requirements of any of the established standards and codes, particularly those detailed above.

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