Premium composite stress test!
We put our premium composite through its paces. We asked ourselves: How robust is the material? What can it withstand? How does it handle different forces? In practice, many installers and users ask themselves: Is the premium composite as robust as brass? Can I work with it in the way I am used to? The development work naturally began a long time in advance and examined the Engelmann Premium composite down to the smallest detail. But we also wanted to know the practical side of things and put the measuring tube to the test with various stress tests. This resulted in five videos that show the different forces to which the material is exposed.
The classic question is what happens if the installer screws the union nut onto the measuring tube at an angle. Is that even possible? What happens to the thread? The first stress test showed that screwing the union nut on at an angle does not work. At least not by hand. The thread remains intact and guides the angled union nut back onto a straight path. More force was needed. In another test, we checked a rigid pipe connection. The measuring tube and connecting tube were offset from each other. Using all kinds of tools and a lot of force that was not practical, we tried to screw the nut on at an angle. Although installers never tighten this much in reality, the test showed that the thread remained undamaged. How robust is the material overall? What better way to find out than to lift an 800 kilogram Engelmann recycling box with a single measuring tube? Asked, done. A forklift truck, the box in question and a premium composite measuring tube worked perfectly together. If 800 kilograms are already hanging from it, what is the maximum load the material can withstand? It went into a laboratory for a so-called tensile test. Engelmann’s premium composite can withstand far more than the 800 kilograms. You can see just how much in the video.
Another, more practical test concerned how we tighten the union nut. How much torque is too much? How many Newton meters are too much? Take a look at the video: We didn’t manage to manually apply enough torque to the screw connection to impress the thread.
