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They're intended to save lives by slowing down a car careening out of control or bouncing it out of oncoming traffic at least. Galvanized steel would increase
by BizarroLand 1y ago
They're intended to save lives by slowing down a car careening out of control or bouncing it out of oncoming traffic at least.
Galvanized steel would increase the hazard by having a higher likelihood of piercing through the shell of the vehicle and striking the passengers than the softer and more bendy aluminum would. It also corrodes over time, so barring an accident aluminum despite its higher initial cost is a better choice of material for guardrails.
Tradeoff is that they would need to make the fines for recyclers so onerous that they would knowingly never accept guardrail material since the only truly effective deterrent is removing the profit motive.
- potato3732842 1y agoGalvanized steel is used the world over. It's a simple engineering exercise to interchange one for the other. Steel has some superior properties with regard to tearing/bending so you can actually make "softer" barriers out of it if that's what you're going for.
- sokka_h2otribe 1y agoAluminum also has some long term corrosion benefits over galvanized steel especially in the context sometimes where they are attached to treated wooden posts. They use isolation these days but still not enough usually.