Ergonomics

Cable pulling is hard work, and if you’re not using appropriate equipment, it’s potentially dangerous. Fighting out cable from a reel can lead to musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs), one of the leading causes of on-the-job injuries.

The material handling world is governed by standards and regulations. Compliance with all these codes can take a lot of time and effort For some standards, however, compliance is wonderfully simple: Just choose equipment that already complies with applicable codes.

In the warehousing industry, we spend a lot of time thinking about order picking.

Should we try zone, wave, or batch picking? Which is better, bigger Order Picking Carts or more nimble Stock Picking Carts? Is it possible to make order fulfillment safer and more efficient at once?

A warehouse cart is a simple piece of equipment, but on the floor, every second counts. If material handling equipment (MHE) isn’t suited to the task — or not capable of handling the load — productivity suffers.

By 2016, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) was ready to address the safety issues associated with scissor lifts.

Every product has its unique manufacturing challenges. When the things you build are big, however, access to work itself becomes the bottleneck. How can workers safely assemble components at either end of an industrial mold, appliance, or sofa, when their reach only extends a few feet?

Multi-level warehouses need material handling equipment (MHE) designed for the job. But choosing material lifts isn’t always straightforward — you’ll need to think about the average size of loads, the variety of materials, and the layout of your operation in order to find an efficient solution. You’ll also need to consider costs, including long-term maintenance, to get the best possible return on investment.

Piece picking, also known as broken case picking or pick-and-pack, is a time-intensive process in which workers retrieve individual items (as opposed to cases or pallets).

In 2019, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) looked through the data on forklift accidents at work. They discovered that forklift operators aren’t the only ones at risk. Of the 9,050 forklift-related injuries BLS tallied in 2017, 1,850 involved pedestrians. That made pedestrians the injured parties in more than 20 percent of these cases. Even worse, pedestrians injured by forklifts required more days off than workers injured in other forklift-related cases.

Mezzanine systems provide a cost-effective way to optimize vertical space in warehouses, storage facilities, and other operations. They’re essentially just raised platforms that hold products and equipment — though they can be fairly complex systems. Catwalks might run between rows, and some systems have multiple levels.