Strong at heart – Testing our hoops to destruction

Aerial Hoop Safety Testing

One of the most important things for us is your safety, we make sure our hoops pass the test. Read on to find out more about our aerial hoop safety testing procedure.

In this video we chose to point load test our hoop.  This is the hardest test to pass, the entire weight is loaded onto a small point on the hoop. As a human to create this much pressure in one spot you would have to hang using just one finger!

Having over 600kg of load applied allows us to obtain the point of which the hoop fails and therefore set a loading limit of 200kg for our hoops. This limit is below the point of failure as long as you adhere to the guidelines and safety tips on our aerial safety page.

This short video shows one of the independent tests, Aerial Hoops carry out to ensure our hoops can carry the 200kg load specified as our max weight limit. Here you can see the team preparing the hoop and 200kg test weight. The hoop is prepared to allow the team to see exactly how the weld performs during the test.

A measurement is taken of the hoop’s dimensions prior and after loading, this allows us to see how the hoop deforms during loading.

The weight is attached at the weakest part of the hoop, the centre lower section. Weight is then applied, and the hoop is watched carefully to see how it performs over a predetermined period of time.

A special dye is sprayed onto the hoop, this allows the test team to see how the hoop’s welded areas perform under load. Any issues with welding will show up at this stage, and again a final visual inspection is carried out.

As an ultimate test we decided to ensure our hoops could stand a much greater loading, and so testing to destruction is the best method. Here we are going to load the hoop with many times more than our specified weight loading of 200kg. We start with 350kg, then 450kg. Then we test the hoop at half a ton, around 500kg, and the hoop is starting to deform but not break.

Let’s increase things a little more! At 580kg we are now looking rather oval in shape but still not past the point of failure.

At 670kg, the hoop finally starts to show signs of failure.

Obviously all our tests are performed with special equipment and not real people, we don’t suggest you test any hoop to destruction using real people!
… That said, we decided to take our testing one stage further. We put real people on our hoop that has been destroyed to show just what happens when a fracture occurs in the metal on a hoop.

What happens with a fractured hoop?

We decided to take a hoop we had tested to destruction and hang from it.

Watch the video to find out what happens…

Please do not recreate what we are doing in this video.  If at any point you find your hoop has a fracture please do not continue using it and discard it.

Individually tested hoops

Should you need to have each and every hoop you purchase individually tested and certified, please contact us before placing your order and we can arrange this process for an extra cost.

Aerial swivels tested to destruction