Wednesday 5 December 2007

Eyes are Irreplaceable!

Always wear eye protection when grinding, spray painting, drilling, welding, sawing, working in a dusty environment, or handling chemicals. Develop the habit of putting on safety glasses or goggles whenever you work with hand or power tools.

Several types of eye protection devices are available:

Safety glasses

Standard eyeglasses and sunglasses provide frontal protection only. If you wear glasses, make sure they have impact resistant lenses. Safety glasses have heavier lenses that can withstand more shock than ordinary lenses.

Goggles

Plastic goggles protect the eyes against front and side impact. Unvented or chemical splash goggles also offer protection against chemical vapours and liquids.

Always wear goggles when striking hardened metal tools and hardened metal surfaces. This will protect the eyes against flying metal chips.

Face Shields

Face shields protect the face against splashing, dust, and chaff. However, standard designs offer very little protection against impact.

If impact protection is needed, wear safety glasses or goggles under the face shield. Special impact-resistant shields are also available.

Always wear a helmet when arc welding!


The eyes, face, and neck need protection against the burning rays of the arc, and from the splatter of molten metal and slag. To protect vision, make sure the welding helmet has a coloured lens with at least a No. 10 shade when welding up to 200 amps. (Darker shades are needed when using higher currents. Get specialist advice)

Never strike an arc before your helmet is on. Never look at an arc from any distance with naked eyes while someone else is welding.

Remember to use eye protection when chipping slag. The slag is often still hot and breaks away as sharp pieces.

Oxyacetylene welders

The lenses in welding goggles should be a No.5 or 6 grade for welding and cutting, and a No.3 or 4 shade for brazing.

Sun protection also important

Always wear sunglasses to protect you eyes while working outdoors to prevent damage by the sun’s ultraviolet rays.

Don't take your eyesight for granted!

Workwear | Safety Boots | Protective Equipment
Granite technical workwear industrial cloths

How will you cope outside this winter?

Keep cosy for as little as £130

Good old British weather is great when you can sit and look at it through the window while sitting by that lovely open log fire. But we all have to go out there at some time, to fix the car, clear the leaves from the garden, scrape the snow from the drive, or just put the recycling out.

Granite Workwear provide a whole range of clothing that is not just to protect you from industrial hazards. Keep the designer stuff clean for when it really counts and still look good in hard wearing every day outdoor clothes for those evening and weekend jobs.

Keeping dry is often the key to keeping warm. The Flexothane range provide breathable comfort with wind and waterproof protection. Keep a Rainsuit handy as well, packed neatly in the back of the car perhaps

Hands and feet are usually the biggest problem to keep dry and warm. The Muck boot range must be among the warmest fully waterproof you can put on your feet. Perfectly designed for comfort, protection and warmth using modern man made materials. The Granite range of work gloves can provide a solution for all activities. The Gripper gloves are warm with high grip waterproof palms yet comfortable to wear.

Layers are important, so build them up with a Highwicking T shirt and polarfleece jacket and Penine socks.

Visit www.graniteworkwear.co.uk and see how you can get fully kited out for as little as £130.00.

Workwear | Safety Boots | Protective Equipment
Granite technical workwear industrial cloths

How do embroidery designs get onto caps, pullovers or pockets?

Most companies have a logo or at least a name they want on their workwear. This design is first digitised so a computer can read it and then converted into vector graphics rather than pixels so there is no distortion of the image whatever the size.

These vector graphics are loaded into the punch program. The puncher on the software decisively determines the quality of the finished stitch content. Here there are dozens of parameters such as, stitch direction, stitch distance, stitch density, stitch pattern and the precedence of stitch work correctly on the motif, the embroidery machine and the textiles to be embroidered. Thus a leather jacket requires a different embroidery program than a cap , even if it concerns the same embroidery motif.

Understandably there are companies which have specialized in the production of the embroidery motifs.

When the embroidery program is ready, it is transmitted to the embroidery machine. Again also in the embroidery machine there are different parameters which can improve the embroidery or make it worse, such as thread tension and embroidery speed.

The embroidery machine is made, in principle, just like a normal house sewing machine, many components look very similar.The essential difference is the amount of needles, which reaches from 6 up to 18 automatically changing needles and therefore usable colours in one motif. Then when the motif is constructed, a quick change of the embroidery piece can be done, which makes the embroidery very interesting especially for bigger works orders.

Multi head machines can do up to 24 embroideries at the same time. This increases the economic efficiency and therefore makes the price per piece lower. With the use of the finished product there are hardly any restrictions. Therefore, work clothes are a favourite for embroidery. Also clothes that needs chlorine laundry, like for example doctor's smocks can be permanently improved with special sewing cotton.

Most of our clients prefer embroidered logos and these modern techniques allow just about any design to be embroidered. Costs do increase according to the size, density and number of colours in the design for the desired article of workwear.

Workwear | Safety Boots | Protective Equipment
Granite technical workwear industrial cloths

Thursday 29 November 2007

GORE-TEX and Workwear

Go in any outdoor clothing shop and the name GORE-TEX® can be seen. Increasingly these fabrics are finding their way into workwear products, particularly boots and jackets. But what is GORE-TEX®?

The GORE-TEX® membrane is the heart of all GORE-TEX® products. It contains over 9 billion microscopic pores square inch. These pores are 20,000 times smaller than a water droplet, but 700 times larger than a water vapor molecule, which makes the GORE-TEX® membrane completely waterproof from the outside, while allowing perspiration to escape from the inside. An oleophobic, or oil-hating, substance is integrated into the membrane, preventing the penetration of body oils and insect repellent that could otherwise affect the membrane

To construct a GORE-TEX® laminate, the GORE-TEX® membrane is bonded between high-performance fabrics that are extremely breathable. All GORE-TEX® fabrics are waterproof, windproof, and breathable. However, there are many different outer fabrics and fabric constructions available so that you can choose what's most important to you: weight, texture, abrasion resistance

Seams and stitching are essential aspects of a garment's construction. Unfortunately, they compromise the water and liquid protective properties of the fabric: seams and needle holes may be small, but they will still leak. That's why they must be completely sealed.

For absolute waterproofness and liquid resistance, gore-tex products rely on GORE-SEAM® TAPE. This unique tape, backed by reliable Gore equipment and know-how, ensures that every seam and tiny stitch hole is sealed.

The use of GORE-TEX® is tightly controlled to ensure its effectiveness.

At www.graniteworkwear.com we have a number of GORE-TEX® workwear products.

Workwear | Safety Boots | Protective Equipment
Granite technical workwear industrial cloths