Reducing health risks with robotic fiberglass cutting

Fiberglass cutting can expose workers to a series of health issues so integrating an automated fiberglass cutting is the way to go. Industrial robots can successfully tackle fiberglass cutting and remove the harmful substances that human workers would be exposed to. These robots also improve the cycle times and quality of fiberglass cutting as they can work without breaks and incredible consistency.

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Fiber­glass is used in the hous­ing, auto­mo­tive and house­hold indus­tries, as well as sev­er­al oth­ers. While it may be use­ful and cost effec­tive, it is also com­posed of mil­lions of tiny glass fibers. Even a sim­ple tap can release thou­sands of these fibers into the air, let alone the fibers released dur­ing the cut­ting process.

When a facil­i­ty uses a man­u­al process for cut­ting fiber­glass, it can cause sev­er­al health prob­lems to work­ers who come into con­tact with these fibers, includ­ing prob­lems with breath­ing and skin irritation.

Fiber­glass fibers can irri­tate the skin, eyes, nose and throat. Work­ers work­ing in direct con­tact with fiber­glass need to wear long-sleeved shirts, gloves, gog­gles and pants to pro­tect their bod­ies from these fibers.

Anoth­er health risk sits inside the worker’s chest. When these fibers are released dur­ing the fiber­glass cut­ting process and inhaled, they can get lodged into the lungs and cause scar tis­sue and tumors. Larg­er fibers can also lead to upper-res­pi­ra­to­ry infec­tions and stom­ach irritation.

These fibers can also get onto cloth­ing and cause con­t­a­m­i­na­tion to the per­son and oth­ers after con­tact. By wash­ing with warm water instead of cold water after close con­tact, fibers can work them­selves into pores, caus­ing infec­tions and oth­er health issues.

While robot­ic fiber­glass cut­ting is faster and more accu­rate than man­u­al appli­ca­tions, the removal of these health risks is one of the main rea­sons man­u­fac­tur­ers should con­sid­er automa­tion of this process.

By tak­ing human work­ers out of direct con­tact with fiber­glass and intro­duc­ing a fiber­glass cut­ting robot to the process, the health risks are cut dra­mat­i­cal­ly. Work­ers are moved behind the robot­ic fiber­glass cut­ter, to an oper­a­tor sta­tion a safe dis­tance away from the fibers released dur­ing the cut­ting process.

Robots​.com, a cer­ti­fied inte­gra­tor for Fanuc, KUKA, ABB, Uni­ver­sal Robots, and Motoman robot­ics, has an array of fiber­glass cut­ting robot sys­tems wait­ing to help you raise the safe­ty stan­dards in your facil­i­ty. For more infor­ma­tion on fiber­glass cut­ting automa­tion, con­tact Robots​.com today online or at 8777626881.

Jun 13, 2013