Geotextile Abrasion Resistance Tester (Sliding Block) - QualiGTX™ GAT SB
Sandpaper and Sliding Block Abrasion Tester for Woven and Nonwoven Geotextiles
The QualiGTX™ GAT SB geotextile abrasion resistance tester rates fabric durability using the sandpaper and sliding block method, the reference approach for geosynthetics that will sit against aggregate in service. A dead-load block presses abrasive paper against a clamped specimen while a motorized platen reciprocates beneath it. The resulting damage gets quantified not by appearance but by residual tensile strength, which makes the result a defensible number rather than a judgment call.
Two figures define the test on this instrument: a 6 kg load held to ±0.01 kg, and a 25 mm stroke repeated 90 times per minute. Those parameters stay locked across every run, so the only variable an operator changes is cycle count. Laboratories can set anything from 2 to 99,999 cycles, which covers quick incoming-goods screening at the low end and extended durability profiling at the high end.
Qualitest North America supplies the GAT SB in an extended-length bench frame measuring 935 × 350 × 450 mm. The narrow 350 mm depth suits laboratories working along a wall bench or in a row of instruments, where depth is scarcer than length. Geosynthetic producers, contract test houses, and civil engineering departments use the GAT SB to verify supplier claims and to qualify fabric before it goes under road base, rail ballast, or armor stone.
