Whenever you pass a new guidepost or flexible signpost on a Hunter-region road, it is a safe bet it was designed and constructed by Thornton business Delnorth International.
Delnorth was started by Boyd Mudryk and David Campbell, and the co-directors have overseen the invention of several generations of guidepost products.
“Basically guideposts are our core business, and with the roadwork going on around Maitland there are quite a few.”
“If you take the drive from Lorn out to Bolwarra you will see plenty of our posts out there.
“The success of our company is tied to flexible steel guideposts, which are basically a full length steel post that can be impacted 4000 times and recover to its original shape.
“That’s what we are exporting overseas and we are strategically setting up manufacturing plants around the world for that product.”
Delnorth is also manufacturing a polymer reboundable lane divider that can withstand 300,000 impacts, and has expanded in to injection moulding in adjacent facility to construct the plastic product.
“We are now working on a one million rebound post that we’ve been developing for 12 months, which is a product that will be much sought after by councils and bodies like the RTA.”
Mr Mudryk said the company’s steel-flex product was a vast improvement on wooden guide posts that would shatter on the first impact with a car or other vehicle.
“Our post creates no damage to the vehicle when it’s impacted. Most definitely there are people out there that have hit our products and been better off because of them.”
Mr Mudryk said the company was especially proud of its contribution to the ongoing quest for safer roads.
“It feels fantastic. There is a lot of satisfaction from being able to contribute to road safety, which is a very, very high priority for us.”
“Our ongoing research and development is focussed on road safety.”
Delnorth is also expanding its traffic product portfolio by developing a glare-reducing screen that could be placed on dividers splitting multi-laned roads.
“When going down a multi-lane road, you could have three lanes of oncoming traffic coming towards you, and at night and in rain or fog that can be quite dangerous.”
“From a safety point of view this product will give a real plus for night-time driving, though it’s not currently used in Australia.
“It is a completely new product but we hope it will be taken up soon.”