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The business elected to go with a fencing product known as Polvin fencing, so when Brent and Jackie Hanslo (who’s parents founded Polvin Fencing Systems) were over from Australia late in 2022, we grabbed a few minutes with them to learn more about this innovative solution.
Polvin’s post and rail product oncourse in Queensland
PVC is far more flexible than wood and steel and has a much higher tensile strength than wood. This means that the risk of injury to a horse upon collision with the fence is substantially reduced. Common injuries to horses resulting from fence collisions are broken bones associated with an inflexible steel fence, cuts and tears from a splintered timber fence and entanglement with a wire fence.
A PVC fence substantially reduces these risks as it is much more resilient to impact and will flex upon collision without breaking. Should the impact be quite heavy, the rails are designed to “pop out” further preventing injury risk. Our PVC product allows for minimal damage and it’s safer for riders too – there’s no sharp edges and they too get the benefit of breakaway technology.
Example of the Polvin double barrier rail
The founders of the company were actually looking for safe fencing for their own property. PVC manufacturing was already the family business and when they looked overseas they saw that PVC fencing was starting to be widely used in the USA and Europe but there wasn’t a comparable product in Australia. They did consider importing the product but found that the high UV in Australia meant overseas formulations didn’t stand up to the environment so they diversified their business and turned their hand to producing their own product that was superior to the rest of the world.
The racing industry is key part of our business model. We actually started with post and rail fencing at Flemington, then after a consultation process with them diversified to the mesh fencing for crowd control to ensure crowd and horse safety. Subsequent to that, we branched out into the production of our running rail product from a design provided by the Club and one of their partners. Flemington is still a key client of ours to this day and we’re proud of the work we’ve done there.
With regards to Ellerslie, oncourse you will see both our crowd mesh product and the Mawsafe running rail.
Polvin mesh crowd fencing
Our product is also oncourse at Randwick, Rosehill and Caulfield, in fact most VIC courses have some Polvin fencing or a Mawsafe running rail.
To learn more about Racing Victoria’s plastic running rail project, click here.
The Mawsafe running rail is also already oncourse at 5 or 6 tracks in New Zealand including Cambridge.
All of our PVC equestrian products are made from the same formula and the only difference is the shape. The running rail has its own features including the innovative kick out post/uprights. Each upright has a pivotal connection to the rail and a slip free connection to the base plate. The design allows the upright to swing away should a fallen rider hit it. Upon impact, several uprights can slip free without losing the integrity of the railing. The rail’s metal base is below ground level – another safety first – so neither horse nor jockey are in danger of striking steel at high speed.
PVC fencing is low maintenance (no painting!), has very high UV resistance and comes with a 50 year warranty. Aside from the occasional clean, it requires zero maintenance and will never rot, warp, flake or peel like its wooden counterpart. Can’t ask for more than that!
Thank you to Brent and Jackie Hanslo for giving up some of their valuable time whilst in New Zealand. To learn more about Polvin Fencing, you can visit their website here.