This page is the range page. It explains what an endless webbing sling is, how the bands differ, how the family is made and tested, what you can customise, and how to order. The individual bands each have their own page carrying the full hitch ratings, capacity tables and inspection criteria for that band — 1 ton, 2 ton, 3 ton, 4 ton, 5 ton and 8 ton.

1. What Is an Endless Webbing Sling?

An endless webbing sling — Type A in EN 1492-1 — is a flat woven synthetic sling formed as a continuous loop: a length of webbing is lapped back over itself and stitched to close the loop. There are no eyes to hook, no fittings to lose and no fixed end that decides which part of the sling takes the load.

One point needs stating plainly, because the product is widely mis-sold. An endless sling is often described as seamless, as having no seams, no joints and no weak points. That is not accurate. An endless sling is closed by a stitched lap splice — that is how the loop is made, and the splice is a real joint that must be inspected. What the design genuinely gives you is four practical advantages:

• The joint is a long overlap, not a short eye. The splice runs along the webbing at an overlap, instead of being concentrated into a reinforced eye that takes the whole hook load in a small area.

• The loop can be rotated. After each lift the sling can be turned so that no single section — splice, hook contact point or bearing area — accumulates all the wear. On a short eye-to-eye sling the same two eyes take every lift.

• The whole circumference is usable bearing area. There is no fixed eye position, so the sling can be positioned wherever the load and the hook require, and a worn section can be moved out of the load path.

• One sling covers several hitches. The same endless sling can be used straight, choked or in a basket, so a small range of lengths covers a wide range of picks.

What an endless webbing sling is not. It is not a round sling, and it is not an eye-to-eye sling. The three are different products under different parts of the same standard, and the differences decide which one you should be quoting:

• Endless flat webbing sling — Type A, EN 1492-1. Flat woven webbing, continuous loop, no fittings.

• Round sling — EN 1492-2. A load-bearing core yarn inside a woven tubular cover. A different standard and a different product; the two are not interchangeable, and a supplier who describes one as the other is mixing the standards.

• Eye-to-eye flat webbing sling — Type B, C or D, EN 1492-1. Flat woven webbing with a reinforced eye at each end, with or without metal fittings.

• One-way / single-trip sling — a lower-rated consumable version for a known one-off lift, where a re-usable sling is not economic.

Where to go next on this page.

• The full range, band by band, is in section 2.

• How to pick a band from the load is in section 3.

• How the slings are made, stitched and tested is in section 4.

• Fibre, ply, width, length, marking and packaging options are in section 5.

• Standards and marking are in section 6, and ordering and export details in section 7.

2. The Endless Webbing Sling Range, 1 t to 10 t

The standard range runs from 1 t to 10 t. Each band has its own colour, its own black stripe count and its own webbing width, and each band has a dedicated page with its full hitch ratings:

How to read that table.

• The colour is a working load limit code, not a material code. Colour tells you which band the sling is rated at. A separate signal — the label colour — tells you the fibre: blue for polyester, green for polyamide and brown for polypropylene. A standard polyester endless sling therefore carries, for example, green webbing and a blue label at the 2 t band: two unrelated signals on the same sling.

• The stripe count is the capacity, repeated as a physical mark. One black transverse stripe per tonne of working load limit, so a 5 t sling carries five. It is the mark to count when the colour is faded, dirty or hard to judge in poor light.

• The width column is a build figure, not a capacity figure. The band is rated because of how it was woven, stitched and tested — not because of its width alone. Width matters most for the bearing surface: it is what decides whether a band marks, scuffs or crushes a finished load.

• The breaking load is a destruction figure. 7 t at the 1 t band and 70 t at the 10 t band are minimum breaking loads at the EN 1492-1 factor of 7:1. They are never working capacities.

Above 10 t. Heavier endless flat webbing slings are made to order, and for very heavy lifts we would normally quote a different product — a round sling, a wire rope sling or a lifting beam. Tell us the load and we will say which one the number points to.

3. Choosing the Band for the Load

Three things decide the band, and capacity is only the first of them: the load, the hitch, and what the load surface will tolerate.

Four rules that decide the number more often than the load does.

• Choking costs you 20% of the rating. A choked lift uses a mode factor of 0.8, so a 3 t band gives 2.4 t choked — that is 20% below its 3 t straight-lift figure, not “about the same”. If the load has to be choked, choose the band on the choked figure.

• An assembly is never the sum of its slings. Two legs within 45° of vertical are rated at 1.4 times the single rating — for a pair of 3 t slings that is 4.2 t, which is 40% more than one sling, not 100% more. A four-leg assembly uses a factor of 2.1, because a four-leg assembly is rated as if only three legs carry the load.

• An off-centre load puts more on one sling. Two slings share equally only when the centre of gravity sits exactly halfway between the pick points. Move it a third of the way towards one pick point and that sling carries 67% of the load.

• What the load will tolerate can overrule the capacity. On a finished, painted or easily marked load, the width of the band — not its rating — is the binding constraint, and the answer is more pick points or a sleeve rather than a heavier band.

The hitch-by-hitch factors, the assembly table and the worked examples for each of those rules are on the dedicated band pages. If you are unsure which band applies, send us the load and the hitch and we will do the arithmetic with you.

4. How an Endless Webbing Sling Is Made and Tested

An endless sling is a piece of load-bearing textile engineering rather than a cut length of strap, and the difference between a compliant sling and a look-alike sits almost entirely in the stitching and the testing.

Why the stitching step is the one to ask about. In a flat woven sling the stitched lap splice is the joint that holds the loop closed, so the lap length, the stitch pattern and the number of stitch runs are performance-critical — not cosmetic. A supplier who describes a stitched endless sling as having “no seams” is describing the same stitched lap a different way, and the useful question is not whether there is a joint but how the joint is made and how it is verified.

About testing. EN 1492-1 works by type testing plus ongoing verification: the sling is rated at a declared factor and the declaration has to be supported. We can issue a test certificate with a batch on request — if you need third-party inspection or a specific certificate format for your market, tell us at enquiry stage and we will quote the verification regime rather than assuming it.

A note on what we will not claim. We do not quote a certification or an equipment list on this page. If your project needs a named certificate, a witnessing authority or a documented factory audit, put it in the enquiry and it becomes part of the quotation.

5. Options: Fibre, Ply, Width, Length and Marking

The band fixes the colour and the rating; almost everything else is made to order.

Fittings are the one thing to be clear about. An endless webbing sling has no end fittings — that is what makes it Type A. If your lift needs shackles, hooks, master links or a swaged end, you want either a separate fitting quoted alongside the sling or a different product from the range (an eye-to-eye sling with fittings, or a wire rope sling). Say so in the enquiry and we will quote the right one rather than making an endless sling do a job it was not built for.

6. Standards and Marking

What the product is built to. Endless webbing slings are made to EN 1492-1, Textile slings — Safety — Flat woven webbing slings made of man-made fibres for general purpose use. That standard covers single-leg, two-leg, three-leg, four-leg and endless sewn flat woven webbing slings, with or without fittings, made of polyamide, polyester or polypropylene, across webbing widths of 25 mm to 450 mm, and it sets out the requirements for design, testing and marking.

Why the standard reference on the label matters as much as the number beside it. A “1 t” marking means 7 t minimum breaking load only if the sling was built to EN 1492-1 at its 7:1 factor. Under ASME B30.9, where the design factor for these slings is commonly 5:1, the same 1 t marking corresponds to 5 t. Under AS 1353 at 8:1 it corresponds to 8 t. Three slings, all marked 1 t, built to materially different margins — which is why our quotation asks for the destination market and the standard you need, not just the band.

What every endless sling has to carry. The marking is part of the product, not a finishing touch. The visible working load limit code is the webbing colour plus the black stripe count; the label carries the working load limit for the straight lift, the fibre, the standard reference, the manufacturer, the length and a traceability code.

• The colour and the stripe count are mandatory under EN 1492-1 for the band. A sling supplied in a colour that does not match its rating, or described as “any colour available”, is not being marked to the standard.

• The label is the second half of the same message. Colour tells you the band; the label tells you the fibre and the traceability. If the label is missing or illegible, the sling is out of service regardless of the condition of the webbing.

• The traceability code is what makes a batch certificate possible. Keep it — it is what links a sling in service back to the batch it was tested with.

7. Ordering, Packaging and Export

Almost every endless webbing sling we ship is made to order, so the fastest route to a firm price is a complete enquiry rather than a band number.

Three things worth specifying even if you have bought these before. The fibre, because it decides what the sling must be kept away from. The length basis (circumference or working length), because it is the most common cause of a sling that arrives and does not fit. And the standard the destination market expects, because the safety factor behind any rating is set by the standard, not by the number printed on the band.

8. Care, Inspection and Retirement

Every sling in this range should be inspected before every use, with a documented periodic inspection on top of that. On an endless sling there are six things to look at, and one of them is easy to forget.

• The stitched lap splice. This is the joint that closes the loop, so it is checked every time: broken or pulled stitches, loose stitching or an open lap means the sling is withdrawn immediately. A splice cannot be repaired on site.

• The webbing body. Cuts, snags, fraying, broken surface yarns and abrasion. Withdraw the sling if damage reaches about 10% of the webbing width in any transverse section — on a 25 mm band that is only 2.5 mm, so measure it rather than judging by eye — or if the load-bearing yarns are exposed.

• The colour and the stripe count. Read them together. If the colour and the stripe count disagree, do not use the sling: one of the two marks has been lost or altered, and the band can no longer be trusted.

• The label. Working load limit, fibre, standard, length and traceability code all legible. Missing or illegible, the sling is out of service.

• Chemical contact. Stiffening, discoloration, softening or swelling, or known acid, alkali or solvent contact: withdraw.

• Heat or UV damage. Glazing, melting, a hard or brittle feel, fading or a powdery surface: withdraw.

Care rules for the whole range.

• Never use a polyester webbing sling below −40 °C or above +100 °C.

• Rotate the loop between lifts. It is the single habit that gets the most service life out of an endless sling: if the same section always sits in the hook, an endless sling wears no better than an eye-to-eye sling.

• Do not drag a sling on the floor or across abrasive surfaces, and never pull a sling out from under a load resting on it — lift the load clear first.

• Do not twist, knot, shorten or lengthen a sling, and never repair one.

• Fit edge protection wherever the band crosses a sharp or finished edge, at any load.

• Clean with mild soap and water and dry naturally; do not machine dry or heat dry.

• Store dry and dark, off the floor, away from oil, chemicals and sharp edges.

• In an assembly, inspect every sling in the set and keep the set together — the assembly is only as strong as its weakest sling.

• Cut a retired sling through before disposal so that it cannot be put back into service by mistake.

9. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Contact us - endless webbing slings direct from the manufacturer

Tell us the load, the rigging and the destination market, and we will come back with the specification and price for your endless webbing sling - band, fibre, ply, width, length and marking all on one sheet. Volume discounts apply, and we build to order in single or double ply, in polyester, nylon or polypropylene, in any length from 1 m to 12 m and beyond, with the EN 1492-1 colour code and one black capacity stripe per tonne as standard. Matching sets for two-leg and four-leg assemblies are supplied on request.

• Contact: Wang Lili

• Phone: 18066002268

• E-mail: 702461526@qq.com

• Address: Lifute Industrial Park, Taizhou City, Jiangsu Province, China

• Send an enquiry >>