I participate in a Traffic Control Review Team here at KDOT where we go out and look at projects under construction. Mostly I ride along to review general roadside safety, TCSB, temporary guardrail, etc. types of installations.
One thing that has come up this year that hasn't come up before has to do with our free standing TCSB installations. I noticed, in some cases, the contractors weren't tensioning the free standing TCSB after it had been placed and the pin was dropped through the loops (i.e. the pin could be freely removed if I lifted it out with my hand). From other conversations on this topic, my recollection is best practice is to tension or pull the barrier tight after installation so it will immediately engage a vehicle during an impact. Is that correct?
When I looked back through the original Temporary Type F3 crash testing report I didn't see the tensioning or pulling mentioned there and I didn't find a question where this had already been asked on the consulting site so now I'm not sure what the best practice is; tension the TCSB or just set it and drop the pin where the pin can be freely removed. I guess my thought is if the barrier isn't tensioned there may be a delay in the barrier engaging the vehicle and the working widths might be greater compared to a pre-tensioned or pulled installation.
Any guidance will be helpful. Just as a side note I noticed my old e-mail is still registered with the Pooled Fund Member's only site. If you respond via e-mail my new e-mail is thomas.rhoads@ks.gov.
Thanks,
Tom
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