Proceedings of the
The 33rd European Safety and Reliability Conference (ESREL 2023)
3 – 8 September 2023, Southampton, UK
Full Guard Testing for Ejection in Machines, From Standard Requirements to Accurate Specification
1Department of Engineering, University of Perugia, Via Duranti, 63, Perugia, Italy.
2AC&E s.r.l. Via Del Perlar 37/a Verona(VR), Italy.
ABSTRACT
Machine Directive (2006/42/CE) states the requirements for designing machine safeguards. In addition, the standard ISO 14120 and the annexes deal with the design of guards for almost all types of machinery.
Following the aim of the law and the mandatory statements, only a well-equipped laboratory can prove and validate the robustness, mechanical capability, stress, and strain state that can be reached during the ballistic impact.
Those requirements claim the necessity of finding "the weakest point on guard," which is tough to fulfill in real testing devices.
The paper presents the design of a new gas cannon device built for maximum flexibility during the test phase and able to shoot in any desired huge guards.
Examples of weak points and design errors highlighted during tests will be discussed according to the most counterproductive point requirements.
Opportunities to modify the state of the art of tests will be discussed at the end of the paper.
Keywords: Machine tools guards, The safety of machinery, Ejection risk, ISO 14120:2015, Safety test.
