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Posted By P.J.O'Callaghan
Hi All
Sorry I should have posted this here not on study forum. Can someone assist me hear I am trying to get information relating to pallet trucks safe operation. The company I work for use quite a lot of hand operated pallet trucks. I feel that it is safer to push as against pulling as it is safer to have the load in front than behind. I am coming up against some firm opposition as the norm has been to pull trucks. We have had a number of serious accidents where the load has pinned the operator against side walls etc. Manufacturers seem to shy away from this and will not mention this in there operational instructions. I would welcome some comments please.
Cheers
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Posted By Penfold
Hi PJ
My personal opinion, most small companies use manual pallet trucks because they are cheap, with little or no consideration for H&S. Most will use them with no risk assessment or training (yes, I know pallet truck training is laughable, but as you have pointed out, they can, and do cause injury). Also, most companies will ask their operators to move extremely heavy loads with them.
You have to look at these trucks as a manual handling aid. Therefore, the Manual Handling regs apply. I did a risk assessment on one of these for a large distribution centre and found that on level ground, the starting and stopping force for a 330kg load was around 250 newtons (25 kg's) This became the maximum for a single person move. Start to increace the weight, and you would need an additional handler who would need to assist in stopping the load as well as staring it.
As for pushing or pulling, I never did get an answer. The question is, Pushing (better ergonomics), or pulling, (you can see where you are going). Let your risk assessment decide.
The bottom line, Manual Handling regs state: Avoid, Assess, Reduce. Option 1, Avoid: buy an electric one (but don't forget the training).
Hope this helps
Pen
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Posted By SCN
Pushing is far better as you have much better control of steering particularly with heavy loads.
Though it was a fair few years ago that I was involved in organising training for my lads using them; there was a bit more to them than met the eye. As usual its down to the quality of the trainer.
What was beneficial was getting an assessment done on starting forces on the different floor surfaces we had. On the smooth painted finish we could move 1100 kgs. On the power floated concrete much less
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Posted By P.J.O'Callaghan
Hi
Many thanks for your responses and I do welcome your comments. I would have thought that the suppliers/manufactures are required by law to provide instructions with plant. The biggest obstacle I have is that management cant grasp the idea that training for pallet trucks is necessary as noted it appears down the scale when looking at training needs
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