SICK publishes machine-safety guide

SICK has published a 116-page, illustrated guide that contains safety requirements and guidelines for North America, highlighting Canadian standards. The document, Guidelines for Safe Machinery: Six Steps to a Safe Machine, is designed for manufacturers, systems engineers, designers and all individuals who are responsible for machine safety to illustrate various methods of selecting and using protective devices. (For Manufacturing AUTOMATION‘s extensive coverage of these standards, visit our Machine Safety portal.)

The requirements for the protection of machinery and people change more and more with the increasing use of automation. The guide is designed to keep end users and machine builders up-to-date. It briefly outlines laws, regulations and standards for the U.S., Canada and Mexico and then details six steps to designing a safe machine, including risk assessment, safe machine design, engineering controls, administrative measures, machine validation and operation.

The guide is not a product catalog, but rather provides a comprehensive look at application examples, technical information, possible solutions, as well as where to go for additional resources. “The safety guide was developed based on SICK’s extensive expert knowledge, application expertise and 60 years of experience,” the company says.

The guide available to download free by visiting www.sickusa.com/safetyguide.