Posted to News on 25th Jun 2015, 12:30
Machinery safety expert ensures international standards met
Meeting its commitment to protecting its employees by working to stringent and widely recognised safety standards, Dubai-based pump specialist Torishima has called on the services of Safety Systems Technology (SST), a UK expert in industrial safety and machine guarding.
After sending engineers to Torishima's manufacturing and repair plant in Dubai to evaluate requirements, SST recommended and implemented measures that ensure that operations at the plant comply with key European and ISO machinery safety standards.
Torishima is one of the largest suppliers of pumps in the Middle East, with many of the company's products used in demanding, large-scale, seawater desalination applications. To support the manufacture and maintenance of these pumps, the company has a large machine shop that is equipped with a wide range of machine tools. At the same site, in Jebel Ali, Dubai, there are also extensive facilities for product testing and paint spraying.
A priority for Torishima is to ensure that its operations achieve the highest levels of safety, and the company decided that the best way to confirm this would be for its operations to undergo assessment in line with internationally recognised standards. After careful consideration, it decided that European and ISO standards would be the best choice, as these provide the most up-to-date and compliant methodology for safeguarding machinery.
To carry out the standards assessment and to provide any measures necessary to ensure compliance, Torishima initially approached three companies. Ultimately it selected SST as its preferred safety partner on the basis of the company's proven expertise and capabilities.
As a first step in the project, SST provided a budgetary proposal for safety upgrades, working from information and photographs provided by Torishima. This proposal being acceptable, an SST engineer visited Dubai and spent 4 days on site carrying out a detailed survey, producing design drawings for the upgrades and generating an accurate quotation for completion of the work.
Tight time schedule
Subsequently, SST produced all of the items necessary for upgrading the machines - principally additional guarding components - and arranged for them to be transported by sea to the UAE in a single 20-foot shipping container. After safe arrival of the items had been confirmed, two SST fitters went to Jebel Ali where they installed and tested the new components, working to a tight time schedule.
The machines upgraded included a horizontal borer, lathes, milling machines, a hydraulic press, a radial arm drill and a shaping machine. SST supplied all of the guarding fitted to the machines with CE Marking and Declarations of Conformity as required by the European Union Machinery Directive 2006/42/EC.
As a result of the services provided and work carried out by SST, machines at the Torishima plant in Jebel Ali now conform with a wide range of European and ISO standards as well as those applicable to specific types of machine tools and presses. Standards include BS EN ISO 12100:2010 Safety of Machinery - General Principles for Design, BS EN 953:1997 + A1:2009 Safety of Machinery - Guards, BS EN ISO 13857:2008 Safety of Machinery - Safety distances to prevent hazard zones being reached by upper and lower limbs.
For further information about industrial safety and machine guarding please visit www.safetysys.co.uk.
