What is an Impact Resistant Glove?

Workers in the oil, gas, mining and construction industries become exposed daily to a diverse range of unforeseen circumstances and hazards, which can result in severe injury to their hands. In these environments, workers are at risk of crushing, puncturing, and pinching-related injuries. Hand injuries caused by impact hazards are painful, costly, and sometimes irreparable. It affects both employer and employee, making it crucial for all to understand the importance of wearing impact protection gloves, especially in industries with high risks of impact hazards.

Back of Hand Protection & How it Works

Impact protection gloves, such as the Graphex® Quantum+ and Armour, contain a patterned thermoplastic rubber backing engineered to provide padding and absorb energy from an impact, resulting in a reduced force of impact transmitted to the hand. These provide metacarpal, knuckle and finger protection, strategically positioned on the back of the hand to protect the user from impact hazards in areas where it occurs the most. The meticulous segmented design of the thermoplastic rubber on the back of the Graphex®Quantum+ allows dexterity, comfort, product longevity and flexibility without compromising maximum protection.

Where & When to Use Impact Resistant Gloves

Graphex® gloves with impact protection, like the Quantum+, provide multiple types of hand protection suitable for numerous tasks and industries with high-risk settings. There are countless manual handling situations, particularly in the mining, oil, gas, construction, manufacturing, automotive and chemical industries. In these industries, workers operate hazardous tools such as wrenches, construction materials such as bricks and timber, and heavy machinery and equipment, making it common to encounter impact hazards to the hand and fingers.

Not only do Graphex® gloves like the Quantum+ offer superior impact protection, but they are also certified under the relevant Australian and European standards to provide protection from lacerations, abrasion, puncture, heat and chemicals for various tasks. It gives the user complete confidence and reason to ensure that they continue to wear protective gloves at all times, no matter the risks they may encounter in various settings.

What Makes an Impact Resistant Glove Certified

The Australian standard AS/NZS 2161.3:2020 adopted the EN 388:2016, A1:2018 in its entirety in November 2020. The impact protection test is the latest addition to this new standard. This test is intended for gloves designed for protection against impact. Therefore, gloves that do not offer impact protection will not be subjected to this test. Conducting the test involves the resistance to a 2.5kg weight impacting 5J (Joules) energy onto the glove. The material may not fracture or split and is measured following EN 13594:2015 as either Pass (P) or Fail (F). If a glove did not undergo this test, it is recorded with an ‘X’.

Certification is an ongoing process that ensures the manufacturing process and facilities, certificates, and the product itself are audited and scrutinised so that all product performance claims are consistently accurate. If an impact resistant glove is certified, it has undergone an extensive verification process of validating its mechanical scores by an independent notifying body such as BSI Benchmark or SAI Global. Asking a trusted and independent notifying body to certify a product provides the distributor, employer and wearer complete peace of mind that the product will perform as expected.

Gloves That Make an Impact

The entire Graphex® range is certified to both European and Australian Standards. It offers utmost protection because of its superior cut resistance, but it also recognises that one glove does not cover all applications. Graphex® has a diverse range to suit several industries, from General Assembly to Oil and Gas. Whether you need a liquid resistant glove or TPR back of hand protection, there is a Graphex® glove that will meet your requirements.

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