Machine Guard Infographic: The Point of Operation

Get the cold hard facts on must-have machine guarding in this infographic. Know the OSHA and ANSI standards, and the principles of safeguarding aimed at protecting workers from unnecessary harm on the shop floor.

Presses. Alligator shears. Guillotine cutters. Grinding wheels. These essential manufacturing machines are incredibly powerful and help fuel production output, but they come with inherent dangers to machine operators and machinists. Their moving parts can cause a range of serious injuries, including amputations, crushed fingers, legs and hands, and blindness from flying cut parts. The goal of OSHA standard (1910.212) is to incorporate safeguards that allow for protected operation of this equipment. There were over 1,900 OSHA violations for improper machine guards in 2017—making it No. 8 on Top 10 OSHA violation list—right in the same spot it had been in 2016.

For those companies that have yet to comply with machine safeguarding standards, it is important to understand these injuries have a business cost. A joint 2015 study from the American Journal of Industrial Medicine found the following when looking at the effects of machine guard injuries in small metal fabrication shops: “While safeguards for metal fabrication machinery can cost hundreds or thousands of dollars, these costs should be weighed against the economic and personal cost of serious traumatic injuries: The average total cost to a business of a workplace amputation is estimated at $133,000, $111,000 for a crush injury, and $95,000 for a fracture.”

Enter machine guards. One of the most important areas to safeguard when it comes to machines is at the point of operation—wherever a material is being cut or being shaped with the help of a worker pressing a button or feeding a material directly into the machine.

Here is what you need to know about safeguarding your machines from the point of operation and beyond.