News / Genesis Rescue Systems - Boron Capability

These exotic metals present a problem for most hydraulic cutters on the market today. Genesis Rescue Systems have recognised the urgent critical need for more powerful cutters and have responded by not only producing some of the strongest cutters on the market, but testing each of them on the latest Boron UHSS steel reinforced vehicles in order to assure rescue personnel of reliable performance during real life extrications.

Boron capable, a registered trade mark of Genesis Rescue Systems, is the designation we give to a cutter that has been tested on some of the toughest UHSS/Boron steels, and has demonstrated the explicit ability to cut these UHSS/Boron reinforced steels on the latest vehicles that employ it. Vehicle manufacturers are continually changing designs, and strengths of different steels, as well as where it is used on the vehicle. Genesis Rescue Systems are continually testing our cutters and their ability to cut these exotic metals consistently, thus providing reliable performance. Though Genesis continually strive to obtain vehicles constructed with the latest high strength steels, it is impossible to attain every make and model being introduced by various vehicle manufacturers.

Therefore Genesis work in conjunction with leading instructors and major insurance companies to seek out the vehicles that present rescue personnel the greatest difficulty in extrication. These specific vehicles are sought out and used for testing Genesis tools. This gives Genesis and the end user the ability to see first hand how the tools will perform in real life extrications, on the toughest vehicles that employ the use of UHSS/Boron steel technology.

The 2004 Subaru WRX Sti is constructed with "two" solid UHSS bars running through the roof posts. This model has proven to be the most difficult to cut with conventional hydraulic cutters. Genesis Rescue Systems recently attained a "B" post from this vehicle courtesy of the State Farm Insurance Extrication Research Team. State Farm Insurance has been active in identifying this new trend in vehicle construction, and is helping rescue personnel across the country to better understand it. As you can see, the "B" post is constructed similiar to any other post except for the two solid bars of UHSS steel running the entire length of it.

This is what creates the problem for today's hydraulic cutters. A hydraulic cutter does not have hard enough steel cutting blades to actually "cut" the UHSS steel, therefore the cutter must build an enormous amount pressure around the UHSS steel to actually cause it to catastrophically crack or shatter. UHSS steel has very similiar properties to that of glass, as it is extremely hard, but very brittle. As you watch the video you can see this concept by listening for the "crack" of the UHSS bars as they are cut. The enormous amount of pressure it takes to "crack" the bars is where hydraulic cutters today don't measure up. All cutters except for the line of Genesis Boron Capable cutters. Genesis Rescue tools currently have 4 different cutters that have been tested successfully on Boron/UHSS steel. Those cutters are the C 231, C 270, C 165 and 16c Brute combination tool.

Some rescue personnel have determined that if their hydraulic cutter doesn't work, they can always rely on the common sawzall. We experimented with this idea and it took our technician 4 mins and a spare set of blades to make it through the B post, compared to only 3 seconds with one of out Boron Capable cutters. These are precious minutes saved in a serious road rescue extrication. The truth is that there are cutters out there that can cut the hardest UHSS/Boron steels, and Genesis has plenty of them to choose from...

     Check out the video at http://www.genesisrescue.com/html/BoronHeading.asp

This article was written on Monday 9 June, 2008
and has been view 1231 times