Industrial Robots Can Prevent Exposure to Chemicals and Health Problems of Workers

May 23, 2017

Industrial robotic welders not only provide increased precision and productivity on the work floor, but also increased levels of safety. Robotic welders are able to tackle the dirty work and remove workers from harmful exposure to chemicals. This further improves the morale and overall safety of the welding production line.

Robots improving worker safety and health

Man­u­fac­tur­ers need to con­sid­er not only how work­ers can be safe around the robots, but also how the robot can increase safe­ty for work­ers. Amongst the most impor­tant jus­ti­fi­ca­tions to use indus­tri­al robots may be to put them in the fields where they are shield­ing peo­ple from work­ing in dan­ger­ous envi­ron­ments that require the han­dling of haz­ardous mate­ri­als such as explo­sives, to car­cino­gens, to radioac­tive sub­stances. Robots are also com­plet­ing heavy duty tasks that are repet­i­tive and strain­ing, help­ing with ergonomics.

Indus­tries real­ize how impor­tant indus­tri­al robots are to con­duct these unsafe work duties that would expose work­ers to dan­ger­ous con­di­tions or injuries. Robots are now so impor­tant for the use of process­es that expose work­ers to tox­ic fumes such as paint­ing, coat­ing, fiber­glass cut­ting, debur­ring and grind­ing. When work­ers are too close to these appli­ca­tions, they can inhale harm­ful fumes or par­ti­cles that can affect the brain, lungs, eyes and skin. 

This ensures the safe­ty and health of work­ers and con­se­quent­ly reduces expen­di­tures on med­ical coverage.

Real Life Prob­lem #1: Man­u­al Welding 

Man­u­al weld­ing expos­es the work­ers to dam­ag­ing nois­es, tox­ic gas­es, haz­ardous fumes, dan­ger­ous met­als, extreme heat, ion­iz­ing radi­a­tion, and ultra­vi­o­let and infrared radiation.

All of the above can cause severe health prob­lems such as pul­monary ede­ma, bron­chi­tis, asth­ma, pneu­mo­nia, emphy­se­ma, heart dis­ease, hear­ing loss, repro­duc­tive risks, and stom­ach ulcers.

Even when every pre­cau­tion is tak­en, man­u­al weld­ing presents many health risks. It can cause short and long term dam­age to the res­pi­ra­to­ry and cen­tral ner­vous sys­tems, blood cells, and kid­neys. For exam­ple, weld­ing rod fumes con­tain the neu­ro­tox­in man­ganese which is linked to Parkin­son’s dis­ease, a neu­rode­gen­er­a­tive dis­ease with no cur­rent cure.

Solu­tion: Robot­ic welders offer the per­fect solu­tion not only for their amaz­ing­ly con­sis­tent pre­ci­sion, but more impor­tant­ly main­tain­ing the health of the work­ers. Many indus­tries are switch­ing to robot­ic welders to pro­tect the health of their work­ers by doing the dirty job around ven­ti­la­tion sys­tems and shields to block out any radiation.

Weld­ing robots pro­vide a safe and effec­tive alter­na­tive to man­u­al weld­ing as they pro­tect lives, avoid acci­dents, pre­vent dis­ease, and save money.

Real Life Prob­lem #2: Robots Offer Solu­tions to Haz Mat Operations

Explo­sive-proof robots are spe­cial­ly designed to work in areas where vapors and fumes could ignite eas­i­ly if met with a spark. For instance, one man­u­fac­tur­er uses indus­tri­al robots for mate­r­i­al han­dling of car steer­ing wheel com­po­nents where there are flam­ma­ble vapors.

Robots can also be used for muni­tions dis­as­sem­bly in places where there is left­over World War II nerve gas ordi­nance. The decom­pos­ing chem­i­cals and mate­ri­als would not be good for humans to pick up so robots are the per­fect choice.

Nuclear Mate­r­i­al Robots can per­form around and han­dle nuclear mate­ri­als where every­thing is radioac­tive. They can even col­lect sam­ples for analy­sis of soils where radioac­tive con­t­a­m­i­na­tion is sus­pect­ed or han­dle bio­log­i­cal haz­ards like virus­es or oth­er pathogens.

It is easy to see why the automat­ing will not only increase the val­ue of your pro­duc­tion line, but also the health of your work­ers. Robots​.com is a cer­ti­fied inte­gra­tor of many lead­ing robot brands and offers both new and recon­di­tioned robots, along with work cell options, at afford­able prices. 

Con­tact Robots​.com experts online or at 8777626881 to fur­ther dis­cuss your spe­cif­ic automa­tion needs.

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