b'Technical informationWarrantyAll Wichard products are warranted to be free of defects in materials or workmanship for five (5) years from the date of purchase by the original end-user. Excluded from this warranty are:Any product which has been improperly fitted.Any product which has been improperly used or used in any application for which it was not intended.Any product which has been improperly maintained.Any product modified without a written approval from Wichard.Any damage being a consequence from alteration, from ultraviolet light exposure or from the normal wear of products.The useful life of any products is determined by its utilisation and an appropriate factor of safety (see page 67). It must be distinctly assessed in each application. Thus no guarantee can be provided for product life, dynamic capacities or any other factor due to the variability in usage. Wichards liability is limited to the repair or replacement of the defective goods exclusive of any other repair. Responsibility and costs of handling, transportation and any custom duties and tariffs linked to the warranty claim are in any case borne by Wichard. Corrosion in marine environment All Wichard products are passivated. Corrosion attacks stainless steel and is always visible in the form of black coloured roughness. Although this is dangerous, it is rarely seen in current use, except in cases where martensitic (HR) steel is in total, prolonged immersion. What many people erroneously call corrosion, is really rust, or oxidation. This is due to outside causes. In the marine environment, stainless steel is subject to consi-derable aggressive forces and is not totally corrosion free. Re-passivation can be accomplished with a passivator such as Wichinox (see page 8). All stainless steel products demand a minimum of upkeep. Stainless steelType Austenitic MartensiticWichardusestop-qualitygradesofstainlesssteelinitspro- Common name 18.12 Mo 17.4 PHducts (see chart). The first type is a low carbon austenitic steelEuropean Standard X2CrNiMo17-12-2 X5CrNiCuNb 16-4(316L), which offers good mechanical characteristics. They areUS AISI Standard 316 L 630non-magnetic steels and most of Wichard products are manu-factured in this grade. The second (17.4PH) is martensitic steelComposition Carbon < 0,03 % < 0,07 %(magnetic), which is referred to as high-resistance steel (HR). Chromium 18 % 16,5 %Why a Wichard shackle?Nickel 12 % 4 %A Wichard shackle is manufactured on a very old principal, for- Molybdenum 3 %ging. Wichard has perfected and machined this process down toCopper 4 %the smallest detail. Reliability and high quality After the row metal bars are checked on chemical alloy and quality, the metal is heated to the right temperature to be forged. Then the metal is pressed in its new shape with great force by a hydraulic hammer. Due to this process the metal obtains an organized structure without any weakness. Because ofthis structure, called fibers, the metal object is not only very strong but also has an elastic property.Casted metal objects of the same design are less strong because the structure in the metal is not the same everywhere in the object. Next to this there is the chance that small air bubbles are enclosed during the casting. This causes a capital weakness in the casted object. Even objects ma-chined from a block of metal can have weaknesses. Where the metal is machined into a curve the structure in the metal is broken and becomes a weak point in the object. When the object is overloaded it will break at this point. Performance and securityDue to the technique of forging every object of the same design and shape has the same properties with a small tolerance of deviation. By control-ling all important factors Wichard can guarantee an accurate breaking load and working load for each individual object.Wichard advises to respect carefully the Working Load (WL) indicated for each of its products. If a Wichard product is overloaded between the safe working load and breaking load the product will deform due to its elastic property. This gives the user an extra safety margin and shows when the product is overloaded. Deformed parts have to be replaced immediately preferably by a part in a larger size.64 I 65'