b'Technical & Research CommitteeWorkingwithamajorinternationalsensormanufacturer,small pieces of work at the machine cycles.There were including commissioning two extensive study projects withseveralsolutionsmitigatingthemultipleoperatorinthe the engineering team, we quickly discovered that the projectworkspaceareaissues,thoughthesesolutionsdidnt economics were adverse. appear to address all of the identified hazards, but in all To work towards development of a potential sensor that mighthonesty once we realized the systems could not be adapted work for a percentage of the time was looking to cost muchto architectural shop work we didnt evaluate them in depth.more than the typical $150,000-$225,000 cost of a sheetComments on Risks in Contrast to Manual Equipmentmetal folder, if the sensor was produced in some quantity.InItisworthnotingthatmanyofthemoreminorrisksare we were to produce a system for our two machines, plus aparallels of the risks from manual equipment, and as most set of spares the costs would have been much higher. manualequipmentisworkedasatwo-manteamsome While economics never thwart a good safety initiative, theyadditional risks apply to manual brakes.would cause the end of power sheet metal folders use, andAs the clamping action is partially controlled each manual reverting things back to hand brakes would lead to morebrakeoperator,therisksofapinchcausebyothersis injuries through the known repetitive motion issues. potentially higher.The Certification Issues of Home-Brewed Solutions Thegruntofoperatingamanualbrakeforbendsand Wedidhaveagoodlookatonehome-brewedsafetycrimping hems is a known strenuous repetitive work issue configuration.While it may have met the spirit of OSHAsand is a large part of why shops invest in power equipment.request,itdidsobycompromisingthe(currentnowAsetoftechniquesacontractorcanusetomakeMetal unavailable) sensors with unapproved modifications, lackedFolders usage safermuch in the way of fail-safe assurances, was largely built outA Deeper Evaluation of the Risksof non-certified components, and was found to generate so many false alerts that it needed to be turned off to do muchReturning to the power mental folder risks, we did a deeper real work on the machine. look at potential ways to mitigate the risks we identified.The To have a certified safety system all components need to bevast majority of the risks required a human failure to result in certified and the various scenarios of sensor failures needspersonal injuries. tobeunderstood&mitigated.TherearelimitationsonWhilewewereunabletodirectlyhaveaccesstothe sensor modifications, and the need to mask off most of thediscussions and rational of the ANSI exemption of power sensors field of view we saw looked to exceed the allowablemetalfoldersfromstandards,throughsomeofthepast modifications. participants we did get an assessment that our study was Most important was the realization that the sensors couldfar from trail blazing, and that those before us centered their NOT differentiate between the work and the operator, sosafety focus on human mitigation.often the sensor system needed to be disarmed. Mitigation Through TrainingInternet Vaporware and Unobtanium Theprimaryaccessofhumanmitigationofpowermetal SeveralcomprehensiveInternetsearchesfoundvariousfolder risks is TRAINING.Each manufacturer offers product mentions of systems.A few were machine specific, typicallyfocused safety training.As we had continued with training for hinge-less open frame folders, but they were at leastourpersonneltothemanufacturersstandards,including shown in prototype form.While offered and promised asperiodic retraining by their representatives, we made it a available or soon available the add-ons intended for thecompany policy that ONLY trained personnel can operate traditional sheet metal power folder are not readily available.our metal folders.The shop superintendent is in charge of Searching Internet archives identified that the vaporwarepolicing usage per company policy.claims are nothing new, with some vendors suggesting theirMitigation through Access Controlproduct would be ready soon for more than five years. As we learned that some injuries across the industry had Diggingintotheissuesofwhythepromotedsystemsoccurred during untrained and unauthorized machine usage, remained unavailable the same unobtanium issues wereand as a corollary much machine damage also occurred as foundtobebehindmuchoftheunavailability-lackofa result of this type of usage, were making good use of the suitable sensors, lack of sensor space in the hinge-point,machinelock-outprovisionsbothatthemachinecontrol inability of sensors to distinguish work from operator, andhead and in controlling whether the machine is powered. harshly adverse economics. As we always had the capabilities and the policies, in our Specialty Solutions for Specialty Situations case we needed to reinforce the discipline of making sure Research did discover a few specialty systems for specialthe machines could not be used if even briefly unattended.situations involving metal folders.Some shops use severalWhile a low-level risk, as the operator would have awareness operators each presenting, loading and handling separateof someone encroaching the backside of a machine, we are further augmenting access control with marked can chained 38 www.mrca.orgMidwest Roofer'