Extra Heavy Duty Tarp: What the Numbers Mean and Which One Will Actually Hold Up
Somewhere on a highway shoulder right now, a driver is chasing a blue rag that used to be a tarp. It tore at the grommet, or the corner frayed, or the wind found a loose edge and stretched the fabric until something gave. The load underneath is wet, or scattered, or both. Most of those failures were predictable. The tarp was labeled heavy duty, which sounds like a promise but is really just a phrase. If you want a cover you can trust with equipment, building supplies or a loaded flatbed, you have to read what's behind the label. Here's how to do that, using a real example: the Loadsaver black and white extra heavy duty tarp from The Tarp Co , which publishes the kind of numbers worth learning to read. "Extra heavy duty" is a claim, not a standard No regulator defines extra heavy duty. Every seller uses it, and plenty of lightweight tarps carry it anyway. The only way to know what you're buying is to look at the specifications, and the best listings give you severa...