By Richard Nethercot, Head of Sales at Interfood Technology
Managing safety has become one of the most important considerations in manufacturing in recent years, but in fast-moving, high-volume environments such as fabrication, it can be challenging. Machinery is becoming faster, while the materials being processed can be heavy, sharp, or difficult to handle. So, why are we still trying to manage risks around the equipment, rather than designing the worst of them out of the machines before anyone has to use them?
As technology becomes increasingly sophisticated, there’s growing opportunity to use it to improve machine safety. Rather than relying entirely on people to avoid hazards, manufacturers and machine builders can design equipment so that exposure to those hazards is reduced.
Designing the hazard out
This is something that we’re already seeing in food processing. On the surface, food processing and fabricating seem to have little in common, but food manufacturing plants can be equally dangerous places, with a high volume of products and machinery that can involve blades, cutting systems, heated surfaces, and rapidly moving components. And until quite recently, there was plenty of opportunity for accidental contact, exposing staff to potentially life-changing injury. That’s why such a focus has been put on designing the risk out of these environments, while still providing practical, easy-to-use, easy-to-clean, and easily maintainable equipment.
This has been achieved in a variety of ways, and many of them have been relatively simple. Sensors are used to identify when someone enters a hazardous zone and trigger an appropriate response. Automated material handling can remove the need for an operator to reach into a cutting area. Feeding systems can keep people physically separated from moving components while allowing the process to continue. This is possible with technology that has become available. Contact with moving machinery accounted for 12% of RIDDOR-reportable non-fatal injuries in the manufacturing industry between 2024 and 2025. For one business, a single incident came with a £700,000 bill, and that’s before you consider the injury itself and what it meant for the person involved. It’s time for safety to become an engineering requirement.
Bandsaws are a good example of where this is already happening. BladeStop, supplied in the UK and Ireland by Interfood Technology, uses active sensing to recognise when an operator is at risk of contact and mechanically brakes the blade within milliseconds. It doesn’t rely on guarding alone or on the operator getting it right every time.
What manufacturers can do now
No fabrication business can realistically redesign its entire operation overnight. Existing machinery, budgets, production requirements, and site constraints all have to be considered. But that doesn’t mean manufacturers have to wait for a complete equipment overhaul before taking action. You can start by looking closely at how people interact with machinery throughout your entire production cycle. That means considering not only normal operation, but also setup, material loading, cleaning, fault-finding, and maintenance.
Risk can often increase when people have to step outside the normal automated process. A machine may operate safely for hundreds of cycles, but if an operator regularly has to reach into a hazardous area to clear material or make an adjustment, that’s where injury often occurs. So, that should be your first point of focus. But in many cases, there will already be relatively simple solutions available. Sensors, automated feeders, and other forms of machine intervention can create a separation between workers and moving equipment without compromising operations or access for cleaning and maintenance.
And where solutions don’t yet exist, that’s where machine designers need to be directing their attention. The challenge is to understand what operators genuinely need to do and then find ways of achieving the same result without putting people directly in harm’s way.
Compliance isn’t the only goal
Regulations and compliance are fundamental to manufacturing safety. But they can’t be the only target. If they were, you could maybe be content with staff training, but expecting someone to remain constantly vigilant around fast-moving equipment is a lot to ask; the mental load becomes significant. And even highly trained and experienced operators can become tired, distracted or make mistakes. When you use engineering to reduce that burden, you create an environment in which employees are happier to work and more willing to stay.
There is also a strong operational argument for designing hazards out of machinery. When processes rely heavily on manual intervention, delays are almost always introduced. You also bring in inconsistencies because even with procedures to follow, we all have our own ways of working. And those inconsistencies provide opportunities for error. So, by reducing the need for people to repeatedly access machinery, you can make production more predictable as well as safer.
If fabrication is to become safer as machinery becomes faster and more automated, safety needs to be considered at the point of design. Removing the hazard before production starts is usually more effective than trying to manage it once people are already working around it. Because mistakes are so easily made.
While risk may be a familiar part of manufacturing, it doesn’t mean that it has to be accepted as an inevitable part of the process. Designing it out is the obvious next step for the industry.
