Highway guardrail end terminal assembly
AssigneeICOM Engineering, Inc.
InventorCarlos M. Ochoa
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An end terminal assembly of a highway guardrail system to enhance safety of a vehicle impacting an end of the guardrail facing oncoming traffic. The guardrail system includes a W-beam type guardrail mounted on a plurality of posts adjacent to the side of a highway. The guardrail includes at least one W-shaped beam having a first edge curl and a second edge curls. A kinetic energy absorbing assembly is integrally engaged with the one end of guardrail to stretch portions of at least one W-shaped beam to dissipate energy from an impacting vehicle. An anchor assembly may be provided as part of the end terminal assembly to provide tension support as desired for the guardrail during rail face impacts and a cable anchor bracket which releases from the guardrail during a head on impact with the end of the guardrail.
Claims9
A kinetic energy absorbing assembly for an end terminal assembly of a guardrail system defined in part by a guardrail mounted on a plurality of posts comprising:
- a tensioning guide having a first end and a second end with a first flange and a second flange extending between the first end and the second end;
- the first end of the tensioning guides having dimensions compatible with integrally engaging the first end of the tensioning guide with one end of the guardrail;
- the first flange and the second flange having configurations corresponding generally with respective edge curls formed on the one end of the guardrail and sized to allow inserting the first flange and the second flange respectively into the edge curls to engage the kinetic energy absorbing assembly as an integral part of the guardrail;
- the first flange and the second flange spaced from each other by a first distance at the first end of the tensioning guide and spaced from each other by a second distance at the second end of the tensioning guide;
- and
- the second distance selected to be larger than the first distance whereby movement of the tensioning guide relative to the guardrail will stretch portions of the guardrail engaged with the first flange and the second flange to dissipate kinetic energy from an impacting vehicle and having an impact plate attached proximate the second end of the tensioning guide whereby the impact plate will face oncoming traffic when the first end of the tensioning guide is engaged with the one end of the guardrail.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.