Experimental Test to Determine Cable Tension Necessary to Resist

Sphere Pass-Through Requirement of International Building Code

The 2015 International Building Code (IBC) and 2015 International Residential Code (IRC) require that
guardrail intermediate railings be spaced so as to prevent a 4.0 in. diameter sphere from passing
through them. (IBC 1015.4/IRC R312.1.3) However, the code does not state that a load is to be applied
to the 4.0 in. sphere. While the absence of that load specification is not critical to solid railing members,
it may be important for wire rope railing infill, since it is flexible. Therefore, in the absence of IBC/CBC
guidelines, a rational load requirement has been developed based on the following:

The 2015 IRC Section R301.5 does address a requirement for railing infill by stating that railing infill must
withstand a load of 50 lb applied over a 1.0 square foot area, applied horizontally and perpendicular to
the railing plane. Applying that pressure over the projected area of a 4.0 in. diameter sphere, the
resulting load on the sphere is calculated as follows::

F= 50 lb/sq ft x 144 sq in/sq ft x p x (4.0 in) 2 = 4.36 lb

4

To allow for dynamic/impact loading, a conservative safety factor of 2.0 is applied:

FMAX = 4.36 x 2.0 = 8.72 lb

Therefore, in the absence of a load required by code, 8.7 lb is used as the standard force applied to a 4.0
in. diameter sphere, which cable railing infill must not allow to pass in order to be IBC/IRC compliant.

The railing infill case to be tested is:

.125 in. diameter, 1x19 construction, 316 stainless steel cables

48.0 in. unsupported cable span

3.125 in. cable spacing, center to center

This represents the thinnest cable in our Ultra-tecy line, hence the largest space between cables, given
our standard center to center cable spacing of 3.125 in. The 48 in. cable unsupported span was chosen
to be convenient for both design and installation of the railing system.

z Copyright 2016 The Cable Connection, Carson City, Nevada. All Rights Reserved.
Railing Mock-Up and Test Arrangement
A steel frame was constructed to support two tensioned cables. See Fig. 1. The cables had been
tensioned to 60% of their ultimate strength prior to installation, to eliminate the possibility of any
constructional stretch during testing. A calibrated load cell was anchored to one end of the frame, and
one of the cables is attached to its opposite end, allowing direct measurement of the tension in that
cable. See Fig. 2.

Fig. 1

Fig. 2

Page 2 of 9
Since there was only one available load cell, a calibrated electronic tension meter was used to duplicate
the tension in the second cable. See Fig. 3. Variation between the two instruments was ruled out by
using the tension meter to first measure the tension in the cable attached to the load cell, and then to
tension the second cable, reproducing the same reading on the tension meter as for the first cable.

Fig. 3

A fixture to support and precisely guide a 4.0 in. diameter steel sphere was built and clamped to the
center of the frame. See Fig.4. The guide rod for the steel sphere was centered between the two cables
and checked for perpendicularity to the plane containing the cable centerlines. The steel sphere was
machined to within +/-.001 in. of its 4.0 in. diameter. Its central bore was machined to be .005 in. larger
than the precision ground .750 in. diameter guide rod. As such, the sphere had no detectable play in the
vertical direction, and ran smoothly on the guide rod.

Page 3 of 9
 Fig. 4

A short cable with a swaged eye was threaded into the sphere. The sphere was then pulled through the
two cables using a calibrated electronic handheld pull-force meter, as shown in Fig. 5 .

Page 4 of 9
 Fig. 5

The frame was built to be adjustable for both cable to cable spacing and cable unsupported span. The
guide rod fixture was clamped to the frame rather than being permanently attached, to allow for
different cable unsupported spans to be tested.

Page 5 of 9
Test Procedure
Several different combinations were tested before settling on the 3.125 in. cable to cable spacing and
48.0 in. unsupported span case.

The sphere pull-through test was performed with cable tension set at 175, 200, 225, 250, 275, and 300
lb.

For each individual trial, the force required to overcome the friction between the sphere and the guide
rod was recorded as the sphere was pulled to contact the cables. The total force required to pull the
sphere through the cables was then recorded, and the friction force deducted from the result.

Care was taken to move the sphere slowly, so as not to impart a dynamic load to the cables.

Care was also taken to pull the sphere with the pulling cable parallel to the guide rod. It was not
considered necessary to constrain the motion of the handheld pull-force meter, since it was found to be
easy to keep the pulling cable very close to parallel by eye. The cable was always held to closer than 5
degrees of parallel, which may easily be discerned by the naked eye. The error introduced by a 5 degree
variance would only be .38%, which may be considered negligible.

Twenty trials were performed at each tension level, recording both the friction force on the sphere and
the total pull-through force for each trial. The friction force was deducted from each total pull-through
force, and the average net force of the twenty trials calculated.

Page 6 of 9
Results
The average net force required to pull a 4.0 in. diameter steel sphere through .125 in. diameter, 1x19
lay, 316 stainless cables spaced at 3.125 in. center to center, with 48.0 in. unsupported span is tabulated
in Table 1. The values shown are for the cable tension levels of greatest interest.

Cable Tension Pull-Through Force

175 lb 7.88 lb
200 lb 8.74 lb
225 lb 9.58 lb
250 lb 10.59 lb
275 lb 11.67 lb
300 lb 13.02 lb
Table 1

Page 7 of 9
All of the average pull-through force results are plotted below in Graph 1.

Pull-Through Force vs. Cable Tension

17

16

15

14
Pull-Through Force, lb

13

12

11

10

7
170 220 270 320 370 420
Cable Tension, lb

Graph 1
While the results show some scatter, it is clear that pull-through force is linearly related to cable
tension.

Page 8 of 9
Recommendations

Based on these results, it is our recommendation that Ultra-tecy cable railing infill be installed per the
following guidelines:

Cable Spacing, Center to Center: 3.125 in.

Maximum Unsupported Span: 48.0 in.

Cable Tension: 225 lb

All Ultra-tecy cable railing infill should be so installed, regardless of cable diameter.

The 225 lb cable tension provides an additional margin of safety of 10% beyond the safety factor of 2.0
applied for dynamic loading. (Using the 9.58 lb avg. push force result from the test data.)

Cable railing infill which is capable of resisting an 8.7 lb load to a 4.0 in sphere is more robust than the
requirements of 2015 IBC/IRC, since the IBC/IRC codes only specify the size of the infill openings and
make no mention of force required to expand them to a larger size.

Page 9 of 9