A machinery engineering and manufacturing company specializing in roll forming machinery and tooling needed to upgrade its system for protecting workers in the vicinity of its purlin stacker. This type of machine handles and stacks extremely large, heavy steel purlins as they come off the end of a steel forming line so that the product can be offloaded by a forklift operator.
There are many hazards associated with purlin stackers, including multiple heavy-duty, high-load, sprocket-driven chain conveyors, high-load scissor lifts, high-force pneumatic and electromechanical positioning actuators and an array of large-horsepower AC motor-driven drive shafts. All of these components work to position and stack the large steel purlins as they emerge from the forming line.
As if adequately addressing the safety of this equipment was not enough, every second of downtime corresponds to fewer purlins produced, which means less revenue to plant operations. Consequently, the old days of configuring an E-stop circuit to shut the entire process down are long gone. Today, multiple safety devices of various types guard the machine and feed into a safety controller that controls the entire process.
