Stainless, especially high-chrome stainless like 18-8 or 440, might be too brittle for guide rail. If this is a northern area, it would have to be a high-chrome stainless to resist road salt. What's wrong with galvanized?
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"...students of traffic are beginning to realize the false economy of mechanically controlled traffic, and hand work by trained officers will again prevail."
There's nothing wrong with galvanized steel in my opinion, but the application is at a wastewater treatment plant where the superintendent doesn't want galvanized for anything, only stainless steel or aluminum. Traffic levels and speeds are both low.
At a public works convention 2 years or so ago, there was an outfit touting powder-coated rail. They were saying it was an alternative to self-oxidizing "rustic" guide rail, which doesn't like road salt either.
I haven't the foggiest what it would cost, but it might be worth looking into.
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"...students of traffic are beginning to realize the false economy of mechanically controlled traffic, and hand work by trained officers will again prevail."
On second thoughht, they had powder coated GR posts & other hardware that is usually galvanized. I'm not sure about rail.
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"...students of traffic are beginning to realize the false economy of mechanically controlled traffic, and hand work by trained officers will again prevail."
Maury...I doubt that you'll see stainless steel in typical guardrail sections. That doesn't mean you can't create your own. There are many SS shapes available. Why not just use SS channel supported by pipe bollards (stainless steel pipe of course!)?
In China we had some fancy process (I would think it was powder coating - spraying on by electrostatic charges I think). This was done for rails, posts and post caps. Why not use wood posts and cable rather than normal guard rails? Find a copy of "World Highways" and they have all sorts of safety stuff advertised in it on a monthly basis.
