Visibility products are personal protective equipment (PPE) worn by persons to protect against health and safety hazards. Visibility products put on the marked in the EU must be CE marked and certified. The following is a quick overview of relevant standards to obtain the CE mark for Visibility products:
Lightweight High Visibility Garments for High Risk Situations
High visibility garments provide protection by making the user visible, e.g. in traffic situations. In a professional setting, the employer must conduct a risk assessment at the work place and equip the worker with a suitable product solution. The EN ISO 20471 is the product standard for high risk situations and replaces the old EN 471.
The standard divides CE marked garments in three classes.
EN ISO 20471 Class 1. Provides the lowest level of visibility. May provide sufficient protection where the risk level is low. Since the background colour requirement in this class allows for the use of many alternative colours in addition to the fluorescent colours, these garments are also used for other purposes than visibility, e.g. to distinguish
between different functions or roles.
EN ISO 20471 Class 2. Provides considerably better protection than class 1. Most often, this level of visibility provides sufficient protection for most usage areas. Examples are construction sites, car parks, airports, harbours, loading bays and railroads.
EN ISO 20471 Class 3. Provides the highest level of safety and is therefore suitable in high risk situations. Mostly used near dense traffic at high speed.
In addition, high visibility garments may incorporate additional safety features. For these purposes, other standards may also be used. As an examples, a high visibility garment can be certified to ISO 14116, the standard for limited flame spread.
Lightweight High Visibility Garments for Medium Risk Situations
Visibility garments CE marked to EN 1150 and EN 17353.
Background
EN 17353:2020 was developed to enable enhanced visibility equipment to be CE marked for use in medium risk situations according to the requirements in EU Regulation 2016/425. For high risk situations, garments must be CE marked to EN ISO 20471.
The standard was developed with design freedom in mind. It was also decided to incorporate visibility accessories in the product standard thereby broadening the scope for the standard. EN 17353:2020 supersedes the below two standards that has now been withdrawn:
- EN 1150:1999 – Protective clothing. Visibility clothing for non-professional use. Test methods and requirements.
- EN 13356:2001 – Visibility accessories for non-professional use. Test methods and Requirements.
Main differences between EN 13356 vs EN 1150 Garments.
Although very similar for garments, there are some important differences between the EN 1150 and the new EN 17353:
Three Product types: EN 17353 is dividing products into three main categories, thereby opening up for garments to be CE marked for daylight conditions or night time conditions only. In EN 1150, products could be CE marked for 24 hour visibility use only.
- Type A: For use in Daylight conditions
- Type B: For use in Dark conditions
- Type AB: For use in daylight, twilight and dark conditions
In addition, there are sub-categories depending on movement or form recognition and the placement of the material (torso/limbs).
Materials and Minimum areas requirements: In both the new and old standard, minimum required areas of materials were defined according to the height of the user. In EN 17353, there are now two categories instead of six categories. In the process, area requirement for fluorescent and reflective materials have been lowered. There are 7 defined fluorescent colour boxes. The material performance requirements are now upgraded and are often in tune with EN ISO 20471 requirements.
Design requirements: As design freedom was a central objective and with the introduction of more product types and sub categories more detailed information on design and the distribution of material is provided. Marking requirements are following the categorization approach to clearly indicate if the product is meant for daytime or night time only use or if it is a product with 24 hour visibility protection.
Examples of Products and types in EN 17353
Medium risk products CE marked to EN 17353 in Reflectil.
In practical terms, all garments CE marked to EN 1150 in Reflectil’s product portfolio falls within EN 17353 category AB3, i.e. products meant for day AND night time protection. Our products will not differ much and have since long been upgraded to the latest materials requirements and are therefore well suited for the new EN 17353 requirements. The only exception is that our current products CE marked to EN 1150 exceed the fluorescent and reflective area requirements in EN 17353. As part of our strategy to protect life and health of the user we have chosen not to lower the visibility materials in our products and the product will remain unchanged. Under the EU 2016/425 Regulation, product certificates are valid for 5 years. As our EN 1150 certificates expire, they will be renewed to the EN 17353 product standard certificates during 2024/2025.
