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Posted By David Bramall
Any thoughts please;
The MH Regs are a little bit light on boundaries regarding safe weight limits for individual or team lifting. As far as repetitive lifting is concerned, the regs are OK, however, when we try to identify an upper weight limit, the regs offer little.
Thank goodness for the MAC tool and the HSE guidance which at least make an attempt to offer advice / guidance.
The question is - what would be a reasonable upper weight limit for single lifts with 1, 2, 3... individuals.
Before we consider the differences between (male/female, environment, shape/balance of load, operation involved (reach, stoop, aids...), what would be a reasonable upper weight limit for a single lift for a single person or two persons, assuming a good stance, posture, lifting at waist height, non twisting operation - in other words lifting in perfect conditions.
Any thoughts greatly appreciated.
DrB
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Posted By John Murgatroyd
Would that be with 1-2-3 equal size and capability individuals ?
Or 1 elderly male and 2 weight lifters ?
Or 2 ordinary males and a small female ?
Or 1 weight lifting male and a one-armed elderly female ?
Or one male of average intelligence who just says: "get a fork lift, I ain't lifting that" ?
Or maybe several individuals who realise that team lifting is fraught with risks and is virtually guaranteed to injure someone if anything goes wrong.....
Would that be the team lifting that the HSE paid a univ much money to investigate, because it wondered why so many people were injured in team lifts. When a one-eyed jackass with no brain could have told them for nowt ?
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Posted By Booney
David,
I believe there are quite a few employers out there who have weight limits in place for MH but these do vary. I am aware that some companies have a 20kg limit, others have 30 or even 35. We have a 25kg max lift in place but then we don't have any awkward or difficult handling so this works for us. Anything above 25kg is placed on a pallet and we ensure all new employees are made aware of this on induction.
I hope this helps?
Kind Regards
Booney
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Posted By Nigel Hollingworth
We to have spent an amount of time on this subject.
The guidance as stated is not totaly prescriptive, but that is how legislation is now, & it is only guidance.
We stay clear of fixing a maximum weight, as the weight of the load is only one factor of the to take into account when assessing the task, i found the MAC tool useful to get a fuller understanding of how the assesment should be carried out, and each task does need assesing.
The 25kg limit is part fact & part urban myth, coming from the diagram in HSE guidance for a staight lift at waist level without twising, repetision of other factors to be taken account of.
Having been a lurker on this forum for sme time, i keep seeing people looking for MS's/RA's on a one fit all case, which is a simple solution to the issue, but wouldnot i suggest stand up to scrutiny by the HSE or any other audit function.
The advise we usualy give is that if it is more than a simple 5-10kg non repetative lif, then it needs a bespoke assesment.
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Posted By Glyn Atkinson
The question - who is Mr and Mrs Average and how much can they lift?
Because we are all Mr and Mrs Individual, then that is how the approach should be done, with definitive assessments in greater depth of anyone with a particular known health problem.
A full manual handling assessment on the task first,
can the work be done manually?,
is it a team lift situation?,
then putting individuals into the job role, making changes for their height, weight, state of health etc will be a fuller approach to give you the limits required on your process.
People are built differently, so their ability to bear weight when lifting will be vastly different.
Even by lowering the amount of distance that an object is carried will make a big difference to your assessment findings for any type of repetitive tasks.
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Posted By Kieran J Duignan
David
While understandable, the assumptions you are making may be rather dangerous in (most of) the real world.
If you want to work out the answer to your question with as much validity as present research permits, study: 'Manutal Materials Handling', A Mital, A S Nicholson and M M Ayoub, CRC Press Second Edition. 1997
Lots of research-based tables and rigorous analysis as the basis for assumptions.
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Posted By Dave Faragher
Hi David,
Go back to basics, a suitable and sufficent risk assessment carried out by a competent person should give you a satisfactory answer to your problem. I dont believe that there is an upper limit, it depends on the persons involved, ie height, weight, build, appitude.
hope this Helps.
D Faragher
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Posted By Peter Leese
That's just one factor ie the person!
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Posted By Davelfc
I am in construction and there is a lot of mechanical lift in place and well resourced.
There are a rather large amount of different wights and measures as you would expect so we have a starting point of Identifying all weights of 20 Kg an then assess how we lift to final position
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