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Our initial focus was on the application of this technology to protect people working with mobile wood-chippers, because of the urgent need for an automatic safety back-up system that requires no action by workers, when a safety crisis occurs whilst feeding material into such a machine. In an allied business, involving use of several large mobile wood-chippers, we found that during any working day, workers can tend to gradually become tired and complacent, increasing the likelihood of miscalculation and accidents. When feeding tree trunks, branches, foliage and general green waste into a wood-chipper, a worker is at risk of being snagged by a projecting branch stub, or slipping, or otherwise being brought in contact with the swiftly turning feed rollers. If the feed rollers catch any part of his body, the worker is split seconds from death or serious injury. The current mechanical control bars and stop buttons installed on most wood-chippers require quick thinking and instant precise action by workers in an emergency (IF THEY CAN BE REACHED), at a time when the individual is most probably shocked, panic-stricken and off balance. It should be kept in mind that the feed system of a large wood-chipper is specifically designed to propel (at a rate of around 1 meter per second) whatever comes in contact with the feed rollers, through and up against a large blade-bearing flywheel of approximately 1 tonne weight, spinning at around 1,000-2,000 rpm. A machine such as this can feed a 4-metre long tree trunk of diameter 30 cm. (12 inches) through in approximately 10 seconds, reducing it to wood-chip less than 4cm. in diameter. The IndSAFE WOOD-CHIPPER SYSTEM leads to automatic immobilization of a wood-chipper’s feed rollers within 200 milliseconds … when any part of a worker’s body, protected by safety bands, enters the danger zone in the feed chute. THIS SAFETY SYSTEM REQUIRES NO CONSCIOUS THOUGHT OR ACTION TO SAVE THE OPERATOR. In addition to wood-chippers, here is a disturbing history of accidents and fatalities in industry and agriculture worldwide, in particular involving machines that use various mechanisms to introduce materials into cutting and crushing chambers. Horrifically, the victim is often caught by the feed system and partially or completely processed by the machine.In the U.S.A. hardly a year goes by without a worker being killed whilst working with a mobile wood-chipper. In the period 1992-1997, seven people lost their lives through being caught by the feed mechanism of mobile wood-chippers and pulled through the chipper knives. In recent years in Australia, a number of tragic accidents involving wood-chippers have also been recorded. It has been estimated that 90% of wood-chipper accidents are fatal.
THE IndSAFE WOOD-CHIPPER SAFETY SYSTEM will provide a “last chance” automatic back up for current manually activated mechanical safety devices and work practice regulations. These current safety measures have proved less than adequate in the past, leading to a majority decision in 2001 by the Full Bench of the NSW INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS COMMISSION, that wood-chippers currently in use in Australia were “inherently unsafe”. With the IndSAFE System, operators must be wearing safety tags to both start and continue to operate machinery. Any absence of safety tags from the immediate vicinity, for more than a pre-set time of say 2 minutes, will initiate a desired response (e.g. cause the feed rollers to stop), thus making the machinery effectively inert and safe. Similarly, if the tags are left near the sensors in the control box or the feed chute (either deliberately or unintentionally) for more than 5 seconds, the sensors will time out, once again causing the machine itself, or the feed system, to become inert and safe. A simplified description of the start/stopping of the stage 2 “proof of concept” prototype
IN SUMMARY: IndSAFE SYSTEMS can deliver a final chance to workers across the industrial scene who find themselves seconds from death or injury after existing mechanical controls, stop buttons, and recommended industrial work practices have failed. The IndSAFE WOOD-CHIPPER SYSTEM is technically superior to current wood-chipper safety systems and the first to effectively use passive tag based radio frequency technology for safety detection on wood-chippers (and potentially on other industrial equipment), in a hot, dusty, mobile, metallic environment. IndSAFE technology has many possible applications spanning all industrial and agricultural fields. AUGERS, PRESSES, BALERS, CUTTERS, CRUSHERS, ROLLERS, MIXERS, DRIVE SHAFTS, CONVEYERS, FEED SYSTEMS etc., are always capable of catching an operator in that one “split second” unguarded moment. The occurrence of a major accident on a worksite can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost time, immediate lost productivity, insurance claims, litigation, business failure, etc ... as well as having a profound long lasting effect on worker morale and employment ... to say nothing of the tragic personal suffering of victim and family. |
IndSAFE
Pty Ltd has developed a radio frequency based MACHINE GUARDING,
SAFETY MONITORING and MATERIAL PROCESSING TECHNOLOGY for
use across the industrial scene. 
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