Safety Standards and References

Portwest safety products are produced to and reference particular standards.

Portwest’s relevant safety garment products are produced to meet the guidelines of one or more of the following standards. Please reference Portwest catalogues, specification sheets and the products themselves to determine the standard relevant to each product. Below is an overview of these standards.

AS/NZS 4602.1:2011 including Amendment No 1. 2016

This standard is the overall High Visibility Safety Garment Standard encompassing “Garments for high risk applications”. Included within this standard is garment design, materials used - both back ground fabrics and retroreflective - labelling and sun protection. Classification of garments includes:

• CLASS D A garment designed for daytime use

• CLASS N A garment designed for night use using retroreflected light

• CLASS D/N A garment designed for day and night use

For products presented as compliant to AS/NZS 4602.1:2011 then the following listed standards may also be taken into consideration depending on the final usage of the product. This standard 4602 is the overall all-encompassing document.

AS/NZS 1906.4 High visibility materials for safety garments.

This standard describes the fabrics for the background material and the retroreflective materials ie. reflective tape that can be used within the garment.

AS/NZS 1957 Textiles – Care labelling.

Labelling and warning tags etc. are an important part of a High Visibility safety garment. Labelling referred to within the main 4602 standard will be taken from this 1957 care labelling standard.

AS/NZS 4399 Sun protective clothing – Evaluation and classification.

UPF (Ultraviolet Protection Factor) is classified in 4399 as: Classification of garments includes:

• 15 - 24 Good protection

• 25 - 39 Very good protection

• 40 - 50+ Excellent protection

UPF rating for clothing should not be confused with sun protection factor (SPF) which is not relevant to textiles.

OTHER REFERENCES EN ISO 11612:2015

The performance requirements set out in 11612 are applicable to garments which could be worn for a wide range of end uses, where there is a need for clothing with limited flame spread properties and where the user can be exposed to radiant, convective or contact heat or to molten metal splashes.

EN ISO 14116:2015/ EN 533:1997

This standard refers to the materials or material assemblies from which garments with limited flame spread properties are made.

BS EN 1149-1:2008

This standard refers to protective clothing incorporating electrostatic properties and measures charge decay. This is particularly relevant to users in industries such as fuel, electricity workers etc.