Industry Standards and Terminology
Now that you know the basics, let’s talk about “industry standards.” Would it surprise you to know that they don’t exist in the off-road world? Wood, who is trying to standardize recovery terms and ratings to help keep people safe, explains, “Industrial rigging and crane industries are littered with safety rules and regulations—and for good reason. But take the same concepts, apply them horizontally on a dirt road, and for some reason the same rules don’t apply. In fact, for recovery gear manufacturers, there are no rules at all.” If that doesn’t scare you, chances are you’re driving a convertible pickup truck with no doors, seatbelts, or rollcage.
A simple web search for recovery gear will yield the same results; overlapping terminology, misused phrases, and, in lots of cases, made-up words. Needless to say, it can be a daunting exercise trying to find the right gear to buy. We recommend looking at the product’s label and asking as many questions as possible of the manufacturer. We found that lots of manufacturer labels are misleading—or worse, missing critical information.
There are two terms consumers should be looking for on their recovery gear label: Minimum Break Strength (MBS) and Work Load Limit (WLL). If you only see one or the other you’re going to have to pull out a calculator. If you don’t see either term on the label, run for the hills. Any good recovery gear manufacturer will clearly indicate the limitations and ratings of the recovery product, and in most cases, converted to both pounds and kilograms. You should also find listed on the tag the type of material, size and length, and country of origin.
Simply put, MBS is the maximum force a rope or strap can endure before break ing and is determined by defined tests. Dividing the MBS by a given number, most commonly 3, 4, or 5, will give you WLL. This ratio results in what is referred to as the design factor for that piece of gear, written as 3:1, 4:1, 5:1, and so on. There is no standard design factor used to determine WLL, as described by Step
22, “WLL is a calculation determined by the manufacturer, adopted rigging industry standards, or the end user” and that it “might also be listed as rated load, rated capacity, or in some cases just rated.” Do you see now how two different pieces of gear with the same MBS can have different WLL? Think of design factor as safety factor; a piece of gear with a higher design factor has more safety built into its ratings. Understanding and staying within the WLL of your recovery gear will help ensure it can be used many of times over.
It’s also important to note the dimensions of the recovery gear. For example, a 2-ply 3-inch by 20-foot strap simply means that it’s made with two layers of 3-inch-wide webbing and is 20 feet in length. While the U.S. is still on the Imperial system, most of the modern world follows Metric. So, you might find the strap is labeled as such or, in many cases, the label outlines both.
Earlier in the article we made mention of the phrase “shock loading,” which is a sudden change in tension from a low load to a high load that is forced on your vehicle and recovery equipment. Heavy jerking on any recovery rope or strap can break down the material and compromise its future use and is especially dangerous with a non-kinetic rope or strap. You may have seen pictures or videos of broken recovery gear on the Internet with scathing reviews, but it makes you wonder if the failure was actually caused by misuse or abuse, such as extreme “shock loading.” Knowing the terminology, the ratings outlined on the label, and the proper applications for your gear are critical.