CONSTRUCTION FIXINGS
is central to the ethos of the Construction Fixings Association whose Full Members want to offer products that have been well developed and will do the job with known performance, independently verified; and are prepared to invest in the twin processes of product development and gaining approvals. They are not interested in just offering the cheapest possible product to gain an order at all costs. They want to sleep at night. They are also prepared to invest in sales staff who understand the benefits of anchors with ETA and can put them across to their customers and to specifiers and to contractors. They also make this expertise available to their distributors to help them do the same. I have already mentioned the key
benefits of anchors with ETA – reliable functioning and well proven performance data – another is quality. In order to be able to affix CE marking once an ETA has been awarded, the manufacturer must satisfy requirements of ‘Attestation of Conformity’. They do this by submitting their factory production control procedures to detailed scrutiny, not only before CE marking is allowed, but on an annual basis thereafter. This means that the products the installer takes out of the box today or tomorrow or in a year’s time, will be to the same specification and manufacture as those which were tested
for the approval and will therefore work in the same way.
in safety critical applications where fixing failures could lead to injury or death. Another area where a change of
specification is fully justified is where the proposed anchor is not the most appropriate anchor for the job. A contractor may have chosen an anchor they happen to like for some reason – it may be easy to install or it may be good in concrete but unsuitable in masonry. Again this is where a distributor with well-trained staff, who are aware of applications and which products suit those application best, will score. And by suggesting more appropriate fixings they will earn the respect of their customer. In many of these areas BS 8539 will
It is understandable that distributors
“…an anchor that has been awarded an ETA can be relied upon to function correctly in a wide range of site conditions and will have performance data that has been independently assessed and can be compared with other similar anchors.”
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working in a price oriented market, where many customers are not interested in quality or safety, should offer cheap and cheerful products so as to compete on price. But the most successful distributors I know, and probably the most profitable, are those who, when the application is safety critical, will only sell premium, quality products made in factories that can be identified. Many white box products from low cost areas of production come from one factory one day and another the next. They have no place
Fastener + Fixing Magazine • Issue 75 May 2012
actually help you as this comprehensive standard, which sets out the responsibilities of everyone involved in the fixings chain, including distributors, will effectively recommend that in all safety critical applications only anchors with ETA should be used. It will not exclude the use of non-approved anchors but it will limit their usage to those very few cases where no anchors with ETA are available. Of course as a British Standard it will not have the force of law but in practice anyone choosing to ignore its recommendations will be taking a big risk with their own liability - and other people’s safety. Recommendations from British Standards may be referred to in court if an ‘accident’ occurs and the HSE considers that failure to adhere to a standard contributed to the cause of the accident or its outcome. So in many cases you will be able to tell your customer that both you and they have little choice but to use a better anchor than the one they had in mind. By ‘up-selling’ you could be doing yourself - and your customers - a big favour. In preparing for the publication of
BS 8539 the Construction Fixings Association will be publishing guides to the code for each of the main stakeholders in the fixings chain – specifiers, distributors, contractors/installers and testers. We will also be revising some of our Guidance Notes to bring them into line with its recommendations and no doubt slipping the odd article into these September pages.
* BS 8539:2012 Code of Practice for the selection and installation of post-installed anchors in concrete and masonry. Due for publication in autumn 2012.
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