IICA members, guests, students and faculty attended the August IICA Sydney Branch Technical Night to listen to Frank Schrever’s presentation on Machine Safety.
Frank (pictured on the right of the image alongside) is a long term member (now chairman) of the Standards Committee SF-4041 for machine safety. This Commottee has produced and is now revising this Standard, and is considering other machine specific standards for adoption.
Frank also represents the IICA on this committee. He discussed what is happening globally in machine safety standards and the key considerations when applying safety design principles to risk minimisation of fixed plant and machinery.
The standards working together with the new harmonised Workplace Health and Safety legislation was also covered. The topic of SIL (Safety Integrity Level) was also discussed at some length.
Question time covered the role of vendors in ensuring machine safety of their equipment, how to manage the transition period between current and future standards, and the differences between machine safety and process safety, especially in coal mining.
Frank has a Bachelor of Applied Science from Melbourne University, has worked in the instrumentation and automation industries for 35 years managing a number of subsidiaries along the way.
He established Pilz Australia in 1998 and managed this operation for 12 years, starting his own training and consulting company, Machine Safety By Design, two years ago.
[Julie Meynell is Secretary, IICA Sydney Branch.]