Skip to main content

Safety covered

Saint-Gobain PAM UK says it has developed the Opt-Emax, a range of one-man operable access covers, in response to health and safety concerns over a perceived increase in accidents occurring from drainage operatives lifting heavy access covers. Through an innovative design, each triangular cover section is independently hinged, said to considerably reduce required effort when lifting compared with traditional access covers. Once opened, the hinge blocks at 900, preventing accidental closure. Paul Thompson, m
December 20, 2012 Read time: 2 mins
5475 Saint-Gobain PAM UK says it has developed the Opt-Emax, a range of one-man operable access covers, in response to health and safety concerns over a perceived increase in accidents occurring from drainage operatives lifting heavy access covers.

Through an innovative design, each triangular cover section is independently hinged, said to considerably reduce required effort when lifting compared with traditional access covers. Once opened, the hinge blocks at 900, preventing accidental closure.

Paul Thompson, marketing manager of municipal castings at Saint-Gobain PAM UK, said: “Our high performance Opt-Emax product provides an assured level of safety for those who need to gain access to below ground services for inspection or maintenance purposes. Our ongoing commitment to delivering assured levels of safety has led to the development of a product that is able to cope with the day-to-day operations that personnel have to undertake, delivering a solution that has the operator at the heart of its design.”

Thompson said Opt-Emax is kitemarked to EN124 and fully compliant with the additional requirements of HA 104/09, SFA and CESWI.

“The product also includes enhanced security benefits, protecting against theft with an innovative locking system,” added Thompson. “Opt-Emax features a ‘master’ cover section that has to be unlocked before the remaining sections will open sequentially. It has also been developed so the entire unit can be protected with just one optional locking kit, which can be fitted retrospectively should additional security or anti-theft capability be required.

Saint-Gobain PAM UK is adding a further three new products to its current Opt-Emax range. The range includes clear opening options extending from 600x450 to 2250x750, plus GripTop anti-skid options for key sizes.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • JCB’s historic fleet deal
    December 4, 2013
    JCB has won one of the biggest single orders in its history after securing a deal for 900 machines worth more than €61 million (£53 million) from leading UK plant hirer Fork Rent. The deal for Loadall telescopic handlers cements Ipswich, eastern England-based Fork Rent’s position as the UK’s biggest hirer of the product and with the most modern fleet of this type of machine. The machines are manufactured at JCB's World HQ at Rocester, Staffordshire, central England, and all are to be delivered before the en
  • IRF World Congress: Safety through technology
    October 17, 2024
    For too long there has been a focus on physical infrastructure itself when it comes to sustainability. Now we understand the interdependence of infrastructure, government agencies and policies, a nation’s health, access to education and much more. David Arminas reports from Istanbul, Turkiye.
  • Get under the surface of asphalt specification, says Keith Harvey
    July 26, 2018
    Specifiers must do more than just scratch the surface of asphalt specification, urges Keith Harvey* Improving the UK’s road network is a serious business. Amid an escalating population, 2016 saw a colossal 916,000 new vehicles registered in the country. The was a leap of 5% on the year before, bringing the total number of vehicles on our roads to 36.7 million, according to UK government figures. What is perhaps even more concerning, however, is the surge in commercial vehicle use of the network. As he
  • Steel wire barriers provide rock fall protection
    February 6, 2012
    In Gibraltar, where the entire population lives on or close to the huge limestone rock that gives the nation its name, the issue of rock fall protection is taken very seriously. Here, a scheme to install a network of rock fall catchment fences has just been completed, which will allow the re-opening of a critically important road at the south-eastern end of the Rock, which was closed following a significant rock fall occurrence in 2002.