Car Stopper or Truck-Rated Bollard? Choosing Between 1.5 t, 3.5 t and 7.2 t Ratings
When is a 1.5 t or 3.5 t car-stopper bollard enough, and when does a site need a truck-rated bollard? A practical guide for New Zealand and Australian specifiers — vehicle classes, approach speed, kinetic energy, foundations and the products that fit each tier.
Why 'stop a truck' is not always the right brief
Hostile vehicle mitigation has a habit of defaulting to the heaviest rating in the catalogue. That is understandable — a 7.2-tonne truck at 80 km/h is the image everyone carries — but it is also expensive. Truck-rated bollards need deeper foundations, bigger excavations, more service diversions and heavier steel. On a footpath behind a car park, or a shopfront on a 30 km/h service lane, most of that capacity will never be tested.
The ANZCTC's Hostile Vehicle Guidelines for Crowded Places and New Zealand Police's crowded-places guidance both start from the same place: assess the vehicle that can actually reach the asset, and the speed it can carry when it arrives. The rating follows from that assessment, not the other way round. Sometimes the answer is a 7.2-tonne bollard. Often it is a car stopper.
The three rating tiers in plain terms
Crash-test standards sort vehicles into classes. Three matter for bollard selection. The 1.5-tonne class (M1 under ISO 22343 and IWA 14-1) is the passenger car. The 3.5-tonne class (N1) is the van, ute and light truck — the largest vehicle most drivers can hire without a special licence. The 7.2-tonne class (N2A) is the rigid delivery truck, and the standards continue upward from there.
The energy jump between tiers is steep. At 48 km/h a 1.5-tonne car carries about 130 kJ of kinetic energy, a 3.5-tonne van about 310 kJ, and a 7.2-tonne truck about 640 kJ. Double the speed to 80 km/h and that truck arrives with almost 1.8 MJ. A bollard rated for the car class is not a slightly smaller truck bollard — it is engineered for roughly one-fifth of the energy, which is exactly why it can sit in a shallow footing.
A four-question test
First: what is the heaviest vehicle that can physically reach the line? Walk it. Height barriers, tight turns, kerbs, bollarded car-park entries and ramp gradients all exclude trucks in practice. If a rigid truck cannot get there, you do not need to stop one.
Second: how fast can it be going? Measure the longest straight approach to the bollard line. A 20 m run from a car-park aisle gives a determined driver perhaps 30–35 km/h; a 150 m straight on a public road gives 60 km/h or more. Third: what is behind the line — a queue of people, a glazed entrance, a plant room? Fourth: what is in the ground? Shallow services and podium slabs push you toward shallow-mount products. Put the first two answers into the threat energy calculator and it will tell you the rating class you are actually specifying for.
When a 1.5 t or 3.5 t car stopper is the right answer
Car stoppers earn their place where the threat vehicle is a car or van at car-park speed: shop and café frontages behind parking, pedestrian routes alongside drop-off zones, school and campus walkways, hospital entrances off internal roads, and plant or substation doors on service lanes. In these settings the realistic hostile or accidental event is a vehicle mounting the kerb at 20–40 km/h, and a rated car stopper stops it with margin.
The LBA F25-60-1548 is rated to stop a 1.5-tonne car at 48 km/h, and the F25-60-3548 a 3.5-tonne van at the same speed — both as a group of three bollards under ISO 22343-1 simulation. They stand 600 mm high on a 410 mm ground beam, or about 180 mm in the shallow-mount TFP version, and come in powder-coated steel or stainless finishes that sit comfortably in a streetscape. If you want a physically crash-tested 3.5-tonne result, the slimmer F16-100-C50 was tested at Transpolis with three bollards at 1.36 m centres.
When you must step up to truck-rated
Three triggers should move you to a 7.2-tonne or heavier rating regardless of budget: a rigid truck can reach the line (shared delivery routes, loading docks, public roads without a height barrier); the approach allows 50 km/h or more; or the asset behind the line is a crowded place — a stadium concourse, transport hub, event space or civic square — where the consequence of under-specifying is measured in lives.
The step up need not mean a deep pit. The LBA F25-100-7548 is physically tested under ISO 22343-1 at 7.2 tonnes and 48 km/h with just 0.4 m penetration, on a 490 mm ground beam. For higher speeds, the TiSO 273-09-S carries a V/7200[N2A]/80/90 rating — a 7.2-tonne truck at 80 km/h — on a 500 mm foundation. Both deliver real truck-class protection with foundations only marginally deeper than a car stopper's.
Mixing tiers across one site
The most cost-effective layouts usually mix ratings. Truck-rated bollards guard the approaches a truck can actually use — the main entrance off the road, the loading route — while car stoppers protect the long frontages and footpaths where only cars circulate. The line is continuous, the look is consistent, and the budget goes where the energy is.
If you are unsure which tier a given frontage needs, send us the site details. Access X specifies and supplies the certified hardware across New Zealand and Australia, and our certified partners handle installation, local warranty and servicing.
Products mentioned in this guide
LBA Group
F25-60-3548 Car Stopper Bollard
Car stopper — 3.5 t @ 48 km/h (ISO 22343-1 simulation, 3-bollard group)
LBA Group
F16-100-C50 Crash-Tested Bollard
Crash tested (Transpolis) 3.5 t @ 50 km/h, 3 bollards at 1.36 m centres • 7.5 t @ 48 km/h digital
Frequently asked
- What is a car-stopper bollard?
- A static bollard rated — by simulation or physical crash test — to stop a passenger car (about 1.5 t) or a van / light truck (about 3.5 t) at around 48 km/h. It is a true hostile vehicle mitigation product, just rated for a lighter vehicle class than truck-rated bollards.
- Is a 3.5 t car stopper enough for a shopping centre entrance?
- Often yes — if the approach is a car park or service lane where speeds stay under about 30–40 km/h and no rigid truck can reach the pedestrian line. If delivery trucks share the approach, or a public road runs straight at the entrance, specify a 7.2 t truck-rated bollard.
- Do car stoppers need deep foundations?
- No. The LBA F25-60 car stoppers use a 410 mm ground beam, and the shallow-mount TFP versions need only about 180 mm — which is why they suit footpaths, podium slabs and sites with shallow services.
Sources & further reading
- ANZCTC — Hostile Vehicle Guidelines for Crowded Places (nationalsecurity.gov.au) →
- New Zealand Police — Crowded places guidance →
- Datasheet: LBA F25-60-1548 car stopper (PDF) →
- Datasheet: LBA F25-60-3548 car stopper (PDF) →
- Datasheet: LBA F25-100-7548 truck-rated bollard (PDF) →
- Installation drawing: F25-60-1548-TFP shallow-mount (PDF) →
- Installation drawing: F25-60-3548-TFP shallow-mount (PDF) →
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