It's happening!
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Rick
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Did you read the last sentence?
Last year, a construction worker miraculously survived after he was electrocuted, thrown from his workstation and then impaled through the anus by a four-foot steel bar.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4507130/builder-china-impaled-anus-metal-bar/
This impaling had nothing to do with robots! Why unfairly paint robots with the same brush?
Last year, a construction worker miraculously survived after he was electrocuted, thrown from his workstation and then impaled through the anus by a four-foot steel bar.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4507130/builder-china-impaled-anus-metal-bar/
This impaling had nothing to do with robots! Why unfairly paint robots with the same brush?
Cagey
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I've spend a LOT of time around automation, and can say that while unsafe conditions certainly exist, they're actually fairly rare. We live in a highly litigious society, so machine tool OEMs go to some pretty wild extremes to make things safe. Then, many times plant operations rules are strict almost to the opposite extreme where it's the safety equipment/procedures making things unsafe. It's much more often the case that workers do profoundly stupid things that get themselves hurt or killed.
I remember when Renault bought into Jeep back in the '80s, they spent a lotta money on automation for those plants, as most of them were operating in the dark ages. Problem was, few people in those plants were used to machinery moving on its own or being able to see or otherwise sense things and make autonomous moves, so they'd end up in harm's way all the time. I never saw so many injuries in my life as I did for the couple/few years they were doing all that rebuilding.
I remember when Renault bought into Jeep back in the '80s, they spent a lotta money on automation for those plants, as most of them were operating in the dark ages. Problem was, few people in those plants were used to machinery moving on its own or being able to see or otherwise sense things and make autonomous moves, so they'd end up in harm's way all the time. I never saw so many injuries in my life as I did for the couple/few years they were doing all that rebuilding.
bagman67
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Fair enough. I don't blame automation, I blame the comparatively low value the Chinese manufacturing complex places on individual worker safety vs. efficiency. We do live in a highly litigious society in the USA, and one downside is higher overhead; but in China, worker remedies are much more circumscribed, and one downside is it's cheap for manufacturers to accept a higher workplace injury rate. You get a large supply of comparatively poorly educated workers feeding the voracious demand for workers on the factory floors, and it's rational for manufacturers to spend as little as possible on safety training and reinforcement (like, "Let's all devote some time to practicing how to STAY OUT OF THE BLACK AND YELLOW STRIPED SQUARE WHERE THE ROBOT LIVES, DOOFUS") so they can continue to supply products at competitively low prices.
Cagey
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True enough. It's not just China or automation, either. As much as the heavy hand of regulation weighs on US businesses, a certain amount of it is truly necessary. Many plants either can't operate in the US, or at least not cost effectively, because the processes and/or materials are just inherently dangerous to people and/or the environment. You go down to a plant in Mexico (actually one of the better 3rd world countries) and the absence of an EPA, FDA, OSHA, etc. is glaringly obvious. Those can be some nasty, scary, dangerous places.
DarkPenguin
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I think that robot was doing exactly what it was supposed to be doing. How often are foot long spikes are normally needed in the making of porcelain products?
Cagey
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I wondered that, too. But, maybe we're biased in our thinking by the word "porcelain", which sort of implies dolls or decorative knick-knacks, etc.
What about toilets? Table lamp bodies? Flower vases? Urinals? Garden Gnomes? Lotsa stuff that has some size/weight to it that are made of porcelain, and those spikes look like they were arranged in a pattern. Could have been they were part of a materials handling robot that moved multiples of a substantial product, and those are locating pins designed to pierce the product while it's still greenware, then hold it in place while it's baked. Or, the points are a convenient shape for centering on a hole in the product that may vary in position by some amount.
All I know is you stay away from robots when they're running, no matter how well you think you know their routine. Even the small ones can be freakishly strong little buggers, and they'll win any strength-based fight with a squishy, fragile meat sack.
What about toilets? Table lamp bodies? Flower vases? Urinals? Garden Gnomes? Lotsa stuff that has some size/weight to it that are made of porcelain, and those spikes look like they were arranged in a pattern. Could have been they were part of a materials handling robot that moved multiples of a substantial product, and those are locating pins designed to pierce the product while it's still greenware, then hold it in place while it's baked. Or, the points are a convenient shape for centering on a hole in the product that may vary in position by some amount.
All I know is you stay away from robots when they're running, no matter how well you think you know their routine. Even the small ones can be freakishly strong little buggers, and they'll win any strength-based fight with a squishy, fragile meat sack.
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