Safe Working Load (SWL) sometimes stated as the Normal Working Load (NWL) is the load that a piece of Lifting Equipment, lifting device or accessory can safely lift, suspend, or lower without fear of breaking. Usually marked on the equipment by the manufacturer and is often 1/5 of the Minimum Breaking Strength (MBS) although other fractions may be used such as 1/4, 1/6 and 1/10
Other synonyms include Working Load Limit (WLL), which is the maximum working load designed by the manufacturer. The load represents a mass or force that is much less than that required to make the lifting equipment fail or yield, also known as the Minimum Breaking Load (MBL). The SWL is calculated using a safety factor For example, 5:1 (5 to 1, or 1/5). An example of this would be a chain that has a MBL of 2000 lbs would have a SWL or WLL of 400 lbs if a safety factor of 5 (5 to 1) is used
Famous quotes containing the words safe, working and/or load:
“Dear, be the tree your sleep awaits;
Worms be your words, you not safe from ours.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“For human nature, being more highly pitched, selved, and distinctive than anything in the world, can have been developed, evolved, condensed, from the vastness of the world not anyhow or by the working of common powers but only by one of finer or higher pitch and determination than itself.”
—Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–1889)
“To watch another carrying a load requires no exertion.”
—Chinese proverb.