In the early 1990s, the National Floor Safety Institute (NFSI) Founder and President, Russ Kendzior went on a global search to find the world’s best and most accurate tribometer and he found it in Munich, Germany. The Sellmaier “FSC-2000 Print”, as it was then known, was the state-of-the-art robotic tribometer which had captured the attention of many throughout Europe. Having been engineered and sold in Germany by a small German manufacturer, this technology had yet to be established in the United States.

Developed for the U.S. market with input from the NFSI, the original “yellow box” was named the Universal Walkway Tester (UWT) and was the first self-propelled, drag sled tribometer in the U.S., quickly catching the attention of the American market. A few years later, the robot-like, self-propelled device underwent a series of improvements and was re-branded the UWT-3000. The now “silver box” version became the fastest growing tribometer in North America and the first to offer a two-digit value (to the hundredth decimal place), LCD display, hard-copy printout of test results, and a field validation procedure.

The widespread use of the UWT-3000 by the flooring industry and others, eventually lead to the development, by the National Floor Safety Institute (NFSI), of the nation’s first DCOF test method: NFSI 101-B (2004) which is today known as NFSI B101.3.

In 2017, MAD Safety Instruments was born and marketed the TRACSCAN to the United States and Canada. Then in early 2020, just as the global pandemic was advancing around the world, MAD Safety Instruments, in conjunction with the German engineers and manufacturer, used the business pause to critically examine and overhaul the original self-propelled drag sled-type tribometer, and bring it up to 2021 technological standards.

TRACSCAN 2.0 TRIBOMETER

Which brings us to the introduction of the TRACSCAN 2.0, the latest generation of robotic tribometer originally engineered and manufactured in Germany since 1990. And it returns the yellow box design bringing it full circle.

Check the used market for those tribometers which are being offered for sale. Ask yourself why that is? Users don’t like them. Repairs are needed too often and are costly.