Warehouse environments are known for being some of the most dangerous working environments, so installing industrial safety barriers is just one way to ensure you prevent serious accidents. Warehouse managers and those responsible for health and safety have a responsibility to carry out regular risk assessments, which can help ensure the working environment is as safe as possible. This includes considering preventing injuries from slips, trips, and falls, ensuring inventory is stacked correctly and moving vehicles only go where they are meant to go.
Industrial safety barriers are a great way to stop wayward vehicles and prevent them from causing costly damage or injury. Their installation means peace of mind that effective, long-lasting protection is in place to stop all types of accidents.
1. Three conditions for effective production
For adequate safety, through safety barriers and industrial protection elements, 3 requirements must be met:
- quality product
- productivity
- safety
Production is 100% safe when proper industrial hygiene and safety measures are ensured in the daily activities of workers.
2. What is an industrial safety barrier?
Do you know what a safety barrier is? A security barrier is a reinforced fencing structure used to protect valuable items such as people, buildings, machinery, and inventory from unnecessary damage caused by vehicles and other moving objects. Safety barriers can also be used to create designated routes and segregate different types of traffic, such as sidewalks and vehicle routes. The industrial safety barrier is to apply this kind of barrier to industrial places. Industrial safety barriers are designed to protect workers and equipment from workplace hazards. They can be used to create physical barriers that safely separate workers from any potential hazards.
Safety barriers are an important part of any health and safety plan and they should be used wherever people or vehicles must be prevented from entering an area. By using safety barriers, employers can help ensure that their workers and valuable equipment are protected from injury or damage.
3. The role of industrial safety barriers
Industrial safety barriers prevent access to potentially hazardous areas, such as those near machinery. Installing industrial safety barriers can help:
Reduce incidents: Prevent inventory damage by physically preventing people from entering dangerous areas or keeping mobile devices away from shelves. Accidental collisions in industrial settings are often serious if not fatal, and installing industrial safety barriers in warehouses and factories can help prevent such accidents.
Keep your equipment safe: In addition to preventing worker injuries, industrial safety barriers can protect pallets, inventory, racks, doorways, and shelves from possible injuries caused by collisions with out-of-control vehicles such as forklift damage.
Enforce health and safety regulations and awareness: Place them appropriately around the warehouse and explain to employees why they are strategically placed there, including how they can help reduce Accidents and Injuries.
Protect your vehicle: Choose reliable, durable, and efficient designs to complement the vehicles currently in use at your workplace so you can avoid costly repairs after an accident cost.
Of course, damage that occurs when a vehicle hits a safety barrier can be costly, but it’s worth weighing up whether the cost is less than the damage that might otherwise occur. Remember – industrial security barriers are often bright and highly visible to ensure they serve as a deterrent in the first place.
4. Advantages of using industrial safety barriers
There are many benefits to using safety barriers in the workplace. From reducing job site accidents and protecting equipment and inventory to complying with safety regulations, there are many reasons to use safety barriers within your warehouse. Here are the common benefits of most industrial safety barriers:
- Follow safety regulations
- Easy to install and maintain
- Protect equipment and inventory
- Reduce workplace accidents
Advantages of using Aotons Industrial Safety Barriers
- Security: This is a critical topic in every industry. If implemented correctly, it ensures a protected working environment for both people and machines. This innovative impact protection technology is made of ARMORFLEX®, which uses special nanoscale processing technology to reorganize the molecular structure of the material into a regular linear network structure. This means that ARMORFLEX® materials have the recoverability and memory ability to absorb delay and dissipate impact energy, and can rebound back to their original shape after impact.
- Flexibility: The split design of industrial guardrails has strong applicability to on-site protection solutions and enables fast and flexible installation.
- Special three-layer structure: shock-absorbing and energy-absorbing layer, support and reinforcement layer, and anti-aging layer. Each layer has different material proportions and physical properties. The three-layer materials are extruded through exclusively developed professional disposable extrusion equipment.
- Cost-effectiveness: After a collision, only damaged parts need to be replaced without dismantling the anchor bolts, making maintenance simple and convenient.
- Easy to install: Provide installation process video. The product features a fully modular design that is easy to assemble and requires no special tools.
- Customization service: Product length, height, and other parameters can be customized, and beam spacing can be customized according to impact height and other parameters.
- 2-Year Warranty: All Aotons security barriers come with a 2-year warranty. In addition, our company promises a free warranty for damage caused by vehicle collisions.
5. Types of Industrial Safety Barriers
All elements of industrial safety must be maintained regularly if we want them to remain in good shape and achieve their main long-term goal of preventing any occupational accidents in industrial facilities. Therefore, we will list here the safety barriers that we consider to be essential in any industrial field.
1) Industrial guardrail
A sturdy horizontal bar prevents accidental bumps. Traffic is contained and guided, and visibility is high. Additionally, it protects areas most at risk for collision due to the movement of pallet trucks, forklifts, side loaders, and other industrial vehicles.
2) Industrial pipe shield
Steel guards for pipes and downspouts provide high-impact resistance. They are very effective in making gutters and pipes very visible on columns, facades, or walls. This allows the operator manning the vehicle to be more careful and avoid unintentional jolts.
3) Baseboard barriers
Pedestrians can easily access the protected area due to their reduced height. Industrial vehicles such as forklifts, pallet trucks, and other trucks use them to protect machinery, racking, and other industrial infrastructure from being struck, scraped, or hit by them.
4) Thin protective barrier
Used to guide commercial vehicle traffic in warehouses and protect other machines, walls, and aisles from unexpected influences.
5) Crash barrier
Providing high safety against manual and electric pallet trucks and forklifts, it is also resistant to impacts from industrial vehicles.
6) Industrial shelf barriers
The protective barrier for metal industrial racks. Composed of two horizontal bars that protect the sides of the shelf and, thanks to its L-shape, the edges of the shelf. They are used to avoid bumps or scrapes caused by industrial vehicles when cornering.
7) Floor guide rail
These are essential to avoid the impact of industrial vehicles. They are highly visible and protect machines, corridors, walls, doors, etc. at low heights.
8) Industrial column protector
The protective barrier for street lights, pillars, columns, posts, etc., with high resistance to impacts, bumps, and scratches. A safe and efficient industrial protective element, a steel plate is integrated into the protective barrier to achieve a durable and strong fixation. They are also widely used in parking lots and garages to deal with unsuccessful parking maneuvers.
9) Shockproof industrial protective bumper
They are used for loading docks and walls. They are highly resilient to absorb and cushion shocks, nicks, scrapes, and accidental bumps. Furthermore, they are used to protect entrances, ramps, doors, corridors, and walls located inside and outside warehouses, industrial buildings, and production plants.
10) Pedestrian handrail
Industrial pedestrian safety railing is used in both outdoor and indoor spaces and can be installed in many different ways.
11) Industry barriers
These are industrial protection and safety elements with high impact resistance, made of steel. They protect spaces from impacts from forklifts, trucks, pallet trucks, etc.
It is possible to incorporate a detachable system that makes it detachable and can be firmly attached again. It makes moving around an industrial warehouse very easy while providing an extra level of security in areas where access control is occasionally required.
12) Industrial door protection
They are vital in protecting the frames and jambs of loading doors, doors, entrances, and other structures from industrial machinery and vehicles. Operators use them to promote responsible driving.
13) Pedestrian protection door
Sidewalk gates and barricades are simple to install and define exits and passages to public or industrial routes for pedestrians.
14) Industrial Foam Protector
In this group of industrial protective devices, we can include a range of profiles, corner fittings, and other protective devices made of high-density foam to protect objects and people from scratches, scrapes, bumps, or accidental impacts.
Usually, they are painted in very eye-catching and recognizable safety colors to mark potential danger areas and thus prevent accidents.
15) Bollards
Bollards are used to protect protruding corners or doors from industrial vehicles accidentally bumping or hitting them.
16) Pedestrian guardrail
They are the perfect combination of shock-absorbing horizontal bars and metal columns with flexible bases for protection and industrial safety.
17) Alignment guide in the loading dock
In outside logistics, they are used to protect loading docks and platforms during vehicle maneuvers. Drivers use them to guide vehicles to loading docks, protecting the integrity of trucks and reducing the likelihood of collisions.
18) Industrial Handrails
They separate and demarcate work areas and areas where you may find industrial vehicles moving. They are considered an inexpensive and versatile source of industrial protection.
19) Industrial loading dock guardrail
They protect against moving vehicles when we approach an open loading dock without assistance, avoiding any risk of falls, tip-overs, and slips.
6. What type of security barrier do I need?
The above introduces various types of industrial safety barriers, so how should you choose the industrial safety barrier that suits you? Each type has a specific purpose. With such a wide range of options, it’s important to choose the right protection method for you and your workspace. This needs to be chosen based on your actual situation.
If you work somewhere where forklifts or heavy machinery operate, you may want to consider installing metal bollards. They can be used on sidewalks to separate pedestrians and vehicles and to protect equipment and other workstations from accidental damage. Lighter guardrails may be used in areas with less traffic.
Warehouse barriers combine safety and practicality. They work in two ways: They protect shelves, shelving units, and other equipment from damage, saving you the expense of premature replacement. A second benefit comes from its highly visible yellow and black finish, which provides a clear, direct visual warning to visitors and employees of the location of hazardous areas.
For example, I have a friend. He’s an MCC panel manufacturer. There are many MCC panels produced for customers in his factory. In order to prevent the products from being hit by forklifts and other machinery, he installed warehouse guardrails in the product placement area to protect the safety of the products.
7. The main reasons why industrial safety barriers are so important
Warehouses and distribution centers have always been dangerous places to work, and as businesses, especially e-commerce, have grown, so have consumer expectations for fast delivery. This increases pressure on fulfillment operations to work more effectively and efficiently to meet demand.
Even under normal circumstances, material handling has traditionally been one of the most dangerous industrial operations. Forklift accidents occur frequently, and dock door openings are an important part of this safety issue, especially in facilities that do not use loading dock barriers. This puts the forklift at risk of accidentally rolling or going off the edge. A fall from 4 feet can be costly and sometimes fatal.
In terms of protecting people on a day-to-day basis, traditional yellow lines on the floor are low-cost and easy to change, but they offer little protection for pedestrians from material handling equipment and do not prevent accidents from occurring. The entire factory or warehouse is a workplace, and even the most automated conveyor systems require secure access. Safety, training, and plant layout all need to be involved.
1) The result of inadequate protection in India
According to data, between May 2020 and June 2021, as many as 116 industrial accidents occurred in the Indian chemical and mining industry, resulting in the deaths of at least 231 workers. In March 2021, the union labor ministry informed India’s parliament that at least 6,500 workers had died while working in factories, ports, and construction sites in the past five years. The actual number is likely to be much higher because smaller factories and work sites fail to register accidents and casualties.
Weak safety procedures and awareness, inadequate risk assessments, and breakdowns in emergency response procedures are believed to be some of the reasons for the accident. Therefore, barriers are an important component of industrial facility safety.
At Aotons, safety comes first. With quality industrial safety barriers, many accidents that result in serious injuries and loss of life can be avoided with timely intervention and appropriate equipment.
Aotons’ safety barriers are designed with safety in mind while still providing design flexibility and access when needed. Each security barrier can also be integrated with other barrier products to provide comprehensive protection.
2) Loading dock safety barrier
Vacant loading dock doors are a dangerous area within any facility. Accidents on these steep 4-foot (1200-mm) slopes can result in serious injuries, sometimes fatal.
3) Factory safety barriers
Separating and defining work areas and walkways and providing fall protection for interior loading and rail docks have long been challenges for facilities. Warehouse guardrails help separate and protect these areas, and some even have removable guardrails for easier access.
All in all, the main reason why industrial safety barriers are so important is that they protect employees and equipment to the greatest extent possible. The use of industrial safety barriers in the workplace can prevent and reduce the occurrence of some accidents.
8. What fields can industrial safety barriers be used for?
Protective structures can be installed in any type of workspace where the risk of its workers to occupational accidents due to moving vehicles, mistakes, or breakdowns in industrial activities is minimal. In addition to protecting the safety of our employees, industrial safety elements protect a building’s concrete floors, walls, shelves, and other features as well.
The following list is a brief breakdown of where industrial protective elements can be used, but they can also be used at specific levels if there is any risk of being exposed to some of the accidents or hazards mentioned above.
1) Safety barrier: logistics and transportation industry
In the logistics and transport sector, there are many risk factors involving structures and people. Perhaps this is the most important area in which industrial security protectors are installed.
2) Safety barrier: machinery and automotive industry
In the mechanical and automotive industries, industrial safety barriers are essential due to the high vehicle traffic in the respective facilities. As we mentioned before, vehicles and their drivers cause the most damage and accidents.
3) Safety Barrier: Industry/Production Sector
Undoubtedly, when a high volume of production activity takes place in the unlikely industrial sector, problems can arise and put machines and people at risk. Factors of industrial production are critical to preventing accidents.
4) Safety barrier: storage
Within warehouse areas, the continuous movement of vehicles and goods poses a threat to personnel, structures, shelves, machinery, etc.
5) Security Barriers: Airports
Airports use transportation such as buses and other vehicles to transport people to the different terminals. People and structures can be damaged by these vehicles.
6) Safety barrier: food industry
The sector requires high standards of control and hygiene, as well as safety barriers to protect the area from any risk of impact.
7) Safety barrier: textile and chemical industry
Textile or chemical industrial facilities need to thoroughly protect their structures, operators, or machines from any possible collisions caused by moving vehicles through the use of industrial protective elements.
9. FAQs
Here are answers to frequently asked questions about industrial safety barriers.
1) What do industrial safety barriers prevent?
Safety barriers in industrial workplaces are designed to withstand the effects of:
- car
- truck
- forklift
- Pallet truck
- Other on-site vehicles
Safety barriers are designed to protect vulnerable objects from accidental impacts from moving vehicles, but the amount of force a safety barrier can withstand depends on the type of barrier.
2) How to calculate the strength of industrial safety barriers?
Most manufacturers provide an impact rating on their safety barriers. The rating is a number in joules. When testing a safety barrier, this number is arrived at by multiplying the vehicle’s speed by its weight, taking into account the angle at which it hits the barrier. These ratings provide guidance on the amount of force a safety barrier can withstand.
3) What causes industrial safety barriers to fail?
If the object changes speed or weight, this will affect how successful the safety barrier is at deflecting impact.
For example:
If the forklift weighs 4.4 tonnes or less and travels at a speed of 5 mph or less, the safety guardrail may be able to withstand the force of the forklift. However, if the driver increases the speed of the vehicle, or if there is additional weight on the vehicle, it may cause the safety barrier to fail. It is therefore important to adhere to strict regulations on vehicle speed and maximum weight on site. This will ensure that the security barrier operates to its optimal specifications.
4) Are there safety standards for industrial safety barriers?
Yes, when investing in a security system, it is important to understand what standards and regulations are in place to help you invest in effective products from trusted vendors. PAS 13 is the Code of Practice for the Installation and Testing of Safety Barriers. It was created by BSI in partnership with the Blue Chip Companies Steering Group and the Health and Safety Executive.
It is designed to help people apply the correct configuration of safety barriers in the field and to standardize guidance on testing safety barriers. Products that comply with PAS 13 can be trusted with their impact ratings because they must meet specific criteria.
10. Conclusion
Safety is the most important aspect of a healthy and successful work environment that every business owner should be aware of. I firmly believe that co-workers who feel safe in their work environment will feel more appreciated and therefore exhibit greater loyalty, thereby increasing their daily productivity. Therefore, the role of industrial safety barriers cannot be ignored.
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