Everyone working around stage machinery and equipment has seen the noticeable red-circular push button with a yellow background installed on machines, controllers, consoles and located on theatre walls. Normally, this red button is labelled as an EMERGENCY STOP — and if pressed — stops machinery or equipment in motion. The Emergency Stop button, often called [...]
We all want more: the most powerful device, the all-option one. We often forget that tailoring the product specifications to our needs might make our job much easier and the product will perform better. An over-performing design approach – for example, a winch with a much higher rated capacity than required or a performer flying [...]
As a result of the agreement between the UK and the EU, the UK is no longer accepting CE marked equipment and machinery. However, don't panic just yet. The UK and the EU have agreed on a grace period of one year for some products, including event industry machinery and equipment. The CE Mark is [...]
Safety requirements and inspections Introduction In the spring of 2020, the long-awaited European standard for safety requirements of stage machinery was published by Technical Committee CEN/TC 433. And within a few months EN 17206:2020 was adopted by several European standardisation bodies. Hence, it is now widely available as BS EN 17206, DIN EN 17206, NEN [...]
Spain has done the homework. During the quiet months of Spring, rigging and H&S experts within the Spanish Event Industry have put together ideas to try to standardise the use of lifting equipment, as a result, the experts produced a short, but practical norm, to regularise the type of equipment allowed and the use of [...]
Introduction On previous machinery risk assessment articles, we explain how to approach the analysis of the severity of injury and two-of-three risk elements concurring to estimate the probability of occurrence of the harm. The third element is the possibility of avoidance. - Article: Estimation of the Severity of Injury - Article: Frequency of Exposure - [...]
Introduction Manual and Electric chain hoists used in the entertainment industry, are normally put into service fitted with a device with the intended use to allow the storage of the load chain: a chain bag (or chain container). Chain bags for hand chain hoists are often designed as a “bucket”, large enough to contain the [...]
Impact assessment study of the Machinery Directive WG1 meeting The European Commission is seriously considering the revision of machinery directive; in 2019 the EC carried out interviews and a public survey in order to collect feedback from the industry stakeholders. The consultation was made by 98 semi-structured interviews and 528 submission of open public consultations. [...]
When drafting a machinery Risk Assessment, one of the most controversial elements to be estimated is the probability of occurrence, and the main reason for such challenge is related to the meaning associated with the word "Probability". Often the term probability is confused with likelihood or predictability, which are derivatives of the concept of probability [...]
When designing and manufacturing stage machinery or a control system, there is always a certain number of documents one needs to produce in order to follow the process of compliance in a consistent manner. Manufacturers produce the drawings for mechanical and structural elements, compile the BoM, collect technical specifications of any relevant component, draft schematics [...]
