ERGONOMIC EVALUATION OF HAND CHAFF CUTTER FOR UDAIPUR DISTRICT
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Date
2006
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MPUAT, Udaipur
Abstract
Hand chaff cutter is one of the common agricultural machinery used in rural areas, but is involved in a significant proportion of limb injuries. Safety standards are somewhat difficult to enforce because manufacturing of hand chaff cutters are done at widely dispersed local workshops. To ease the fodder cutting operations a commercially available hand chaff cutter was evaluated with 12 male workers to asses its suitability for workers of western region of India. The parameters used for the ergonomical evaluation include machine operation at different speed, heart rate and discomfort ratings. The mean value of heart rate of the subjects ranged from 95.01 to 114.04 beats/min for 95th percentile subject, whereas 5th percentile subject showed maximum heart rate ranged from 111.64 to 137.04 beats/min. For 5th percentile subjects hand chaff cutter operation was graded as “heavy” at operating speed of 40 and 45 rpm. For 50th percentile subject hand chaff cutter operation was graded “moderately heavy” at all selected speed of operation. The overall discomfort rating (ODR) ranged from 7.50 to 8.25 while the body parts discomfort score (BPDS) ranged from 46.75 to 65.75. The 5th percentile subject had maximum BPDS value i.e. 65.75, whereas 95th percentile subjects experienced minimum discomfort. The BPDS value for 95th percentile subject was 46.75, and for 50th percentile, the mean BPDS value was 50.00. The majority of discomfort experienced in neck, clavicle left, clavicle right, left shoulder, right shoulder, left elbow, right elbow. The 5th percentile subjects showed maximum discomfort in these body parts. The output capacity of hand chaff cutter was found minimum 14.1 kg/hr at 25 rpm and maximum 18.5 kg/hr at 45 rpm. Due to high discomfort of 5th percentile subjects the need of modification in existing hand chaff cutter felt. For that reduction of 50 mm in stand height of hand chaff cutter was suggested. After modification of hand chaff cutter mean working heart rate and mean Δ HR of subjects decreased 1.25 percent and 4.75 per cent respectively, while the decrease in ODR and BPDS were found 5.09 and 13.3 per cent.
Description
ERGONOMIC EVALUATION OF HAND CHAFF CUTTER FOR UDAIPUR DISTRICT
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Citation
Singh, 2006