It’s time to play tilt-a-car

Picture source: http://www.shamskm.com/
INDUSTRIAL ENGINEER – VOLUME 44, NUMBER 7

Carriage eases the pain of working on vehicle interiors
William Marras, who runs The Ohio State University’s Center for Occupational Health in Automotive Manufacturing, found a conclusion that tilting beats sitting down on the job when it comes to protecting autoworkers from injury. He co-authored two studies about Applied Ergonomcis especially in automotive industries. Basically the studies are about how using cantilevered chairs and tilting a car sideways on a carriage reduced stress for common installation tasks. Using the commercially chair reduced stress on workers’ backs and shoulders for three common installation, but workers who stood while working could reduce stress for nine different tasks. It will be possible if the car was tilted sideways, so the chair become unnecessary.

The chair only reduced shoulder stress while workers installed the roof console and insulation and tightened bolts in the center of the car. It didn’t help when workers need to reach the sides or back of the car. Seven different installation tasks became less strenuous when the car was tilted 45 degrees on its side and the other two when the car was tilted sideways at a 90-degree angle.