Soll-Xenon energy absorbers
Staging area during install
Gravitec's team of engineers have designed, fabricated, and installed fall protection systems worldwide.
Our clients often contract with us to survey their sites and recommend, design, or install fall protection systems. As a result, our teams of engineers, consultants, and installers have worked all over the world, from factories to wilderness areas, from shipyards to hangers, from churches to breweries, and from mountains to seas; in short, wherever people work at heights. We often survey our clients’ facilities and then recommend the most effective off-the-shelf products we can find. Sometimes, for more challenging problems, we design and fabricate fall protection equipment. In 16 years, we have earned a reputation worldwide for solving all kinds of fall protection problems, from the mundane to the unique.
We can design, supply, and install new fall protection systems for all types of indoor and outdoor facilities, including:
- Railroad Loading Terminals
- Truck Loading Bays
- Telecommunications Towers
- Window Washing Systems
- Food Processing Plants
- Hydroelectric facilities
- Manufacturing Plants
- Water Towers
- Airplane Hangers
- Churches
- Breweries
- Commercial Buildings of All Kinds
Depending on the needs of our clients, we have built:
- Horizontal Lifeline Systems
- Rigid Rail Systems
- Certified Anchors
- Portal Systems
- Davit Systems
- Roof Anchors
- Ladder Climbing Systems
- Customized Fall Protection Systems of All Kinds
In addition to designing new systems, some of our clients ask our engineering department to evaluate existing anchors or fall protection systems. We can perform static tests and dynamic tests on anchors, lifelines, and other types of systems to be sure that they will perform adequately.
Meeting Our Clients' Needs
The goal of our engineering department is to understand our clients' priorities and meet or exceed them with the most cost-effective solutions possible. We design systems to meet five primary design criteria:
- The forces experienced by a falling worker must be kept below legal limits.
- Every mechanical component of the arresting system must stay within its strength limitations.
- Anchors must be capable of transferring the loads generated by a fall to the ground without deflecting excessively or failing.
- The falling worker must stop within available clearances.
- Each system must have at least one feasible rescue option.
In addition, good systems also allow workers to perform their tasks with as much mobility as possible.
The decades we have devoted solely to the fall protection industry help us understand our clients’ needs and select the best technology for each job. Our engineering team participates in national and international standards groups, so not only do our designs meet current standards, we can help our clients look to the future too.
Cost-Effective Solutions
Because Gravitec is also a fall protection training company, our engineering department uses a unique approach to eliminating fall hazards. We begin every project by thinking about how to re-engineer the work to avoid exposing workers to the hazard at all. Next we look at using traditional fall protection methods like guardrails and handrails. Only after evaluating those options do we begin to apply standard engineering principles to build fall restraint systems or fall arrest systems. We call this working through the fall protection hierarchy and we have saved several of our clients a great deal of trouble using it.
Our engineering department has developed proprietary software to evaluate options and find cost-effective alternatives. Our software considers site conditions, local prices, and our clients’ special requirements. When we design a solution, we usually generate two or three primary options for our clients to choose from.
Because we are distributors for all major manufacturers of off-the-shelf fall protection gear, we can usually pass on significant cost savings to our clients for the equipment they purchase.
Tailoring Our Services
Depending on our clients’ needs, we offer two kinds of engineering services. For those clients looking for a complete solution, we offer turnkey services where we prepare plans and specifications, solicit bids, and supervise installation ourselves. For our clients who want to take on some of the work themselves, we can prepare design documents only and then serve as consultants after that. Whether we are evaluating an existing fall protection system or designing a new one, whether it is a turnkey or design project, our goal is always to understand our client’s priorities and meet or exceed them with the most cost-effective solutions possible.
