Titan Jaws: Accurately test the safety of children's clothing

Our range of grips, clamps and Titan tool fixtures play an essential role in testing to the BSI standards specified in PD CEN/ TR 16792:2014.

This legislation provides specific recommendations relating to the design and manufacture of children's clothing, particularly the security and mechanical design of garment attachments, including buttons, toggles, and zips.

One of the elements heavily stressed in the regulations is that 'when designing children's clothing, it is essential to take into consideration the behaviour of children, whose need for exploration and challenge drives them to use items in new and different ways'. This aspect of their behaviour increases their susceptibility to certain hazards, such as choking when a clothing fitting attachment becomes detached from a garment.

This is of particular concern for children under 36 months who are known to place such items, in their mouth and might also place these into their nose or ears. To pre-empt this risk specific recommendations have been put in place aimed at tackling this potentially dangerous issue.

CEN/ TR 1679:2014 Outlines:
'It is essential that all components attached to children's clothing for children under 36 months are securely attached and remain throughout the normal or reasonably foreseeable period of use of the garment.'

BSI Standards Publication

Security of garment attachments

Outlined in the standards are recommendations about the most appropriate fastening to be used to attach fixtures, including the most relevant stitching to be used. This includes the security of small non-textile components and the force that is needed to be applied in order for one of these items to become detached, in Newtons.

It is this testing that our Titan fixtures have been precision engineered in order to conduct. As the instrument is operated using the Testwise operating system the standards can be quickly transferred for easy setting up of the test. Results and anomalies are instantly visible and any necessary amendments can be made easily.

The broad selection of tooling fixtures, compatible with both the Titan 5 and Titan 10, means that clothing manufacturers are capable of assessing a variety of different garment attachments. This includes buttons, press studs and zips as well as many others.

We work hard to fully understand standard requirements and develop instruments which are specifically designed to help our customers adhere to these, with our company mission to make this process as easy and pain free as possible.

Peter Goodwin, Technical Specialist

Titan Fixtures for CEN/TR

Outlined below is our range of specialist tooling with specific information about the standards they are suitable for testing against. We have also included recommendations about which fixtures to use together and outlined the various test processes to follow.

T4 Button Holder Clamp

(used with T27 Universal Pneumatic Fabric Grips)

  • For testing buttons to destruction
  • Tests the security of button attachments
  • Supplied with integrated debris shield
  • Designed for testing to standards including; CEN/TR 16792:2014, BS 4161, M&S P122 and Next TM37

T12 Press Fastener Upper Grip

(used with T12 Attachments Kit)

  • Tests the security of various children's garment attachments including poppers, snap-fasteners, press studs, buttons and more.
  • Adheres to standards including CEN/ TR 16792 and EN 71-1
  • Included is a range of grips and pneumatic lowering clamps

T14 Zip Testing Kit

(used with T27 Universal Pneumatic Fabric Grips)

  • Tests the strength of different zip elements
  • The kit includes a range of different grips (pictured below)
  • Tests to standards including CEN/ TR 16792, BS 3084, ASTM D2061, EN 16732

 

T16 BS 7907 Attachments kit

(T16 Attachments Kit)

  • For testing the security of fine and smaller garment attachments
  • The kit comprises of an Extension Upper Body, Diamante Finer and Three Pronged Grip
  • For standards including BS 7907 and CEN/ TR 16792

 

T24 Button Box

(used with T27 Universal Pneumatic Fabric Grips)

  • Used for testing buttons and tack-buttons (studs)
  • Developed inline with a range of standards including both BS 7907 and CEN/ TR 16792
  • Includes 4 slotted plates: 3 mm, 5 mm, 7 mm and 10 mm

T27 Universal Pneumatic Fabric Grips

(pair)

  • Used for strength, slippage and tear testing - up to a maximum force of 5000N
  • Includes both full width and grab jaw faces (flat rubbers)
  • Does this adhere to any standards?

OctoGrip - Press Fastener

  • This gripping system is to be used with the T12 attachment kit
  • OctoGrip has eight claws for efficient gripping of small attachments
  • It tests the security of poppers, snap-fasteners, press studs, buttons and more
  • Does this adhere to any standards?

 

If you would like to find out more information about our specially designed Titan grips and the tooling available in line with CEN/ TR 16792, please either contact us or your local Technical Sales Partners.

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