Crushed hands, lacerated body parts, fractured bones, seems like a scary scene of a thriller movie? But, tragically, these scenes exist very much in the real world. Every year we hear about a thousand injuries, several deaths at the industrial workplace. The reasons? The use of mechanical equipment without maintaining adequate guarding and safety measures in the workplace.
Of course, mechanical devices are crucial for most industries, and it is impossible to keep production up without them. So, ensuring workers’ safety using machine guards is the least industries can do.
Machine guards and their purpose
A machine guard is a shield, cover, or barrier installed in the equipment to prevent contact between workers and moving parts- preventing life-threatening hazards. It intends to enable the personal safety of the operators and others involved in the maintenance and servicing of the instruments, the care that often requires reaching through, over, or under the machines.
How machinery equipment may cause injuries
The hazard parts likely to cause injuries are:
- Any rotating shafting, gearing, cable, sprocket, chain, clutch, coupling, and fan blades
- The ingoing pin-points of any belts, chain, and cable
- Keyways, keys, bolts, set-screws, and any flywheel that projected any opening, spokes, and protrusions
- Any shearing points like slide blocks, roller feeds, and conveyor feed
- Any machine that cuts, breaks, crushes, and contains scorching parts that exceed the 120-degree temperature during normal operations
How do machine guards reduce hazards?
As we are aware of hazardous parts that cause injuries, let’s see how the installation of machine guards can reduce the risk of hazard that causes severe injuries.
- Safeguards are made using correct design and perfectly fitted materials, ensuring easy access and allowing the perfect distance between workers and parts.
- It is placed in dangerous parts to create barriers away, so the problematic aspects stay out of reach of users, operators, and bystanders.
- It controls the temperament and maintains the balance between equipment temperature.
- Injuries cause downtimes in work. So, by reducing the risk of injuries, machine guards increase the workers’ productivity.
- It is strong enough to create a rigid barrier over the machine- reducing the risk of any unexpected crushing while operating.
- It prevents the machine from ejecting material and protects the users, operators, and bystanders against the hot burn.
- The safeguard has the option of ventilation to let the machine fight agents overheating.
- They protect from debris, flying sparks, and splashing chemicals and keep the environment healthy.
Final words
To conclude, machine guards can enhance personal safety and reduce the risk when fitted with suitable instruments. However, the guards also need to be of the highest quality and fully compliant with all the regulatory standards and safety procedures. No matter how well-designed the guards are, though, it won’t help if not used correctly and carefully. So, the user should ensure that the guards are on machines when running, especially around the children.
But before that, let’s check out different machine guards on display at https://usamachineguards.com/.
