Postural load balancing in daily personnel planning in an assembly line for trailer production by working posture analysis

Author

Brandi, C. ; Mertens, A. ; Butzler, J. ; Schlick, C.M.

Author_Institution

Dept. & Inst. of Ind. Eng. & Ergonomics, RWTH Aachen Univ., Aachen, Germany

fYear

2014

Firstpage

1471

Lastpage

1475

Abstract

In this industrial engineering study working postures of 57 workers in an assembly of a trailer manufacturer were analyzed according to the OWAS method and its extension to head postures. For eight especially stressful work tasks 19714 body postures were analyzed. Overall the working posture analysis identified a largely acceptable postural load. A significant influence of the work task on relative frequencies of posture categories and work posture combinations assigned to the same action category was found. Differences in working postures within the same work task could be identified. Finally it is shown that the conducted work posture analysis can help to improve the stress situation of workers through postural load balancing.

Keywords

assembling; industrial engineering; occupational health; personnel; OWAS method; assembly line; body postures; daily personnel planning; head postures; industrial engineering study; postural load balancing; trailer production; worker stress situation; working posture analysis; Assembly; Ergonomics; Load management; Occupational safety; Open wireless architecture; Standards; Stress; OWAS; postural load balancing; working postures;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management (IEEM), 2014 IEEE International Conference on

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/IEEM.2014.7058883

Filename

7058883