Premium Quality Safety Label Materials

Material Choice Matters
If your responsibility includes product safety labels, you must make sure they’re durable enough to withstand your product’s expected environment of use. Possible injuries and deaths – and your company’s liability exposure – depend on the materials used in the manufacture of your product’s safety labels.

When the wrong materials are used, every time a single label peels off, fades or delaminates, people will be unnecessarily put at risk and your company’s product liability exposure increases. That’s the case when a single label fails. If product safety label durability is compromised for an entire product line, the safety and liability implications will be multiplied to the point where they could have a huge impact on your company.

Labels Built to Last
At Clarion Safety, we understand the importance of durability. Your safety labels and markings are only as good as the materials used in their production. It goes against logic for you, the product manufacturer, to put thought, time and expense into developing a safe product which incorporates a well-designed system of safety labels, and then jeopardize its integrity by choosing incorrect, inadequate materials.

That’s one of the major reasons why Clarion Safety chose 3M to be our vendor of choice for the vast majority of the adhesives, base materials and overlaminates we use in the production of our products. As part of 3M’s elite group of Preferred Converters, we offer our customers the finest adhesives, base materials and overlaminates. When special applications call for something other than our superior grade standard materials, our 25-year relationship with 3M combines with our own wide breadth of experience, satisfying the needs of thousands of customers in hundreds of industries, to give you an unmatched level of safety sign and safety label materials expertise.

Each of the exceptional materials we’ve chosen for our standard and custom products has unique, high-performance characteristics. If you expect that your products will be used in environments that may pose a material durability issue, we’ll work with you to find a solution. Read more about the materials that we use on a regular basis to meet specific customer requirements.

The Construction of a Clarion Safety Label
Our safety labels are a composite of compatible premium quality material layers, each with a distinct function. The illustration below shows the material components used in the production of our standard “P” (indoor/outdoor) and “B” (outdoor) polyester safety labels.

Adhesives and Application Procedure
The backing layer of our labels peel off to expose the premium quality 3M adhesive. When you use our application procedures, the pressure sensitive adhesive on the label’s base material forms a bond with your product's surface. Our standard polyester label products use one of the finest 3M adhesives available – it has 3M's highest combined rating for adhesion to both low surface energies and high surface energies (such as both plastic and metal surfaces, including powder-coated painted surfaces). Safety label adhesion is a critical factor for equipment that has a long life expectancy.

Free Application Tools and Instructions
We want you to obtain the longest service life as possible from the safety labels you purchase from us. That’s why, as a no-charge service to our customers, we include free application squeegees and protective squeegee sleeves with every first-time order. To enable correct application, it’s important to adhere to our easy-to-follow-instructions for surface preparation and safety label application which are also included with first time orders. To order additional application squeegees and sleeves, simply contact us.

The Importance of Color Stability
The colors used on your safety labels, and their stability, are an important aspect of your safety label system. The right colors are needed for compliance to national and international codes and standards related to safety signs and labels. Colors also play a role in your labels’ effectiveness. Color helps your safety label to stand out from its background. If you’re using ANSI Z535.4 formats, colors provide people with a code, once learned, to understand the severity levels of the hazards your labels are meant to identify. It’s for these reasons that your labels’ colors remain significant throughout your product’s expected life. From a “right” color standpoint, you can be assured that Clarion Safety’s products are produced within very tight color tolerance boundaries set by the ANSI and ISO standards. How do we understand this so well? Our founder, Geoffrey Peckham, chaired the ANSI Z535.1 Safety Color Code standard for 14 years. From a stability point of view, the pigments used in the vast majority of our products are the same as those used for exterior automotive paints…and that’s saying a lot. Clarion Safety knows the science behind color and color stability.

UL® and RoHS Compliance Certification
Few printers go to the lengths we do to assure our clients that their label materials have the utmost in integrity. For many years, Clarion Safety has had its standardized label material constructions UL® approved. This on-going program gives you the assurance that comes with official third party nationally recognized testing laboratory (NRTL) certification.

Clarion Safety's primary certifications are as follows:

Standard Label Material Choices
Listed below are our most common product safety label materials and regulatory data sheets. For more information on Clarion Safety’s standard materials, visit our product data sheets.

Specialized Material Choices
In addition to our standard premium quality 3M polyester “P” and “B” label constructions, Clarion Safety offers a wide variety of specialized materials to meet your company's specific safety labeling requirements, including:

Overlaminates

• Protective outdoor overlaminates for improved UV resistance
• Writeable overlaminate that allows you to add your own information
• 3 mil velvet textured polycarbonate overlaminates for improved scratch resistance
• Temporary peel-off overlaminates (pre-mask) that mask your labels during painting

Base Materials

• Various thick polycarbonates
• Various high temperature anodized aluminum plates, with and without adhesive backing and/or holes
• Various aluminum plates with and without adhesive backing and/or holes, with and without adhesive backing and/or holes
• Etched and filled stainless steel, aluminum or zinc plates, with and without adhesive backing and/or holes
• Tamperproof label stocks
• Silver/platinum metalized polyesters for the look of metal labels

Adhesives

• High temperature adhesives for short-term heat resistance
• Low temperature adhesives for temperatures below freezing
• Adhesives resistant to most solvents for washdown environments
• Adhesives resistant to UV exposure
• Adhesives for bonding to low (LSE) and high (HSE) surface energies
• Thicker adhesives for bonding to textured and powder coated paint surfaces
• Air bubble flow-out structured adhesive for perfect application of large labels

For more information on label materials and durability requirements, contact us at (877) 748-0244 or compliance@clarionsafety.com.