InTents October/November 2019 - 52

business | tips and techniques

How to document your
tent anchoring plan
When submitting a permit application, use industry-developed
tools and your manufacturer's data to explain your plan.

he anchoring plan for your tent or
structure is the one part of your
permit submittal package that will
change from job to job. The key to any
plan is to present a professional, easy-toread document for your permit of icial to
follow and understand. The Tent Rental
Division (TRD) of the Industrial Fabrics
Association International (IFAI) has built
tools for you to use just for this purpose.
Here are a few pointers to help you
develop a system to produce your own
plan for each installation.

T
Tent permit guide
What should be included in a
tent permit application package?
Tent manufacturer Aztec Tents,
Torrance, Calif., has published a
guide for tent rental companies.
The document, Tent Permit
Submittal Guide, covers topics
such as site layout, ﬂame
certiﬁcation, evacuation plans,
statement of structural integrity
and the anchoring plan.
The guide is available on
the Aztec Tents website,
www.aztectents.com, in the
"Client Resource" tab in the
"Documents" section. Printed
copies are available from Aztec
regional account managers.

Know your engineering
The starting point for your anchoring
plan will be the reaction load data from
your tent manufacturer's engineering
documentation. This reaction data will
show you all of the forces that must be
resisted by your anchoring system under
the analyzed wind pressures. Often,
this information is available in generic
form on a simple one-page reaction
forces summary document or structural
drawing from your tent manufacturer.
This information is also commonly shown
in product manuals and installation
instructions. Pay close attention to the
required safety factors because most tools
and testing will only provide failure loads.

Use your tools
TRD has produced two engineering
studies to put engineering and science
behind how products are anchored and
secured in the commercial tent industry.
52 intents

oct-nov 2019

The IFAI Staking Study, completed
in 2006, was intended to provide tent
renters with a valuable set of data they
could use to estimate the holding power
of traditional tent stakes. It addresses
different staking variables such as stake
diameter, stake embedment depth, stake
inclination, stake fastening heights, group
staking and different load angles. The
study also provides tables of baseline
holding capacities in different soils
and shows ways for ield personnel to
correlate individual site conditions to the
chart of listed loads. Information from the
staking study is summarized in Pocket
Guide: Pullout Capacity of Tent Stakes and
IFAI Procedural Handbook for the Safe
Installation and Maintenance of Tents and
Fabric Structures.
The TRD Ballasting Tool, completed
in 2012, was intended to provide tent
renters with a viable method to address
anchoring a tent without groundpenetrating devices. The study addresses
multiple methods/con igurations of use
that will match up with the engineering
data provided by your tent manufacturer.
The results of this study were used
to create variable formulas based on
the design criteria of your tent system
combined with the speci ic dimensional
details of the ballast you intend to use. The
output of the Ballasting Tool provides you
the weight in ballast you need to resist the
forces you enter into the input form.
TRD members may download the pocket
guide and the handbook and access
http://www.aztectents.com
InTents October/November 2019

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