Safety Direct America can use six different test foot (slider) materials for floor slip resistance testing in different situations with the BOT-3000 digital tribometer.

(1) A Neolite slider is specified for ANSI B101.1, wet static coefficient of friction.This test should not be done in the wet condition to assess safety.

(2) Leather, used for dry testing only (leather’s properties change unpredictably and irreversibly when it gets wet) and appropriate for testing floor waxes. Remember: accidents don’t happen on clean and dry floors, so results from this test don’t say much, if anything.

(3) Four S rubber is a standard material for the pendulum floor friction tester and can help if pendulum and BOT-3000 readings are being compared. However, the BOT-3000 readings are often misleading when using Four S rubber in the machine. This isn’t recommended.

(4) SBR rubber is the standard slider for ANSI B101.3 and ANSI A326.3 wet dynamic coefficient of friction.

(5) TRL rubber is soft and is appropriate for barefoot situations or where only soft-soled shoes such as athletic shoes are likely to be worn. It’s been used for pendulum testing for decades. Test results using this rubber and the BOT-3000 can be very misleading, saying slippery floors are slip resistant, and vice versa. We cannot recommend using this rubber in the BOT-3000.

(6) High-density polyurethane is used for heels of many women’s shoes and has been used by shoe stores for checking candidate new flooring. People need to adjust to the traction of new shoes, and in a shoe store the customer could get an unpleasant surprise when trying on new shoes on a slippery floor. High-density polyurethane has very low traction, wet or dry, on many floors.