Design of polishing tools for improving work posture in furniture industry

Work-related musculoskeletal disorders are one of the greatest occupational health concern today. Awkward working posture is a physical factor identified in occupational musculoskeletal injuries. As shown in the polishing process, workers must perform in awkward postures like stooping and squatting to reach the entire surface of the product. This study aims to determine how much risk arising from polishing process and propose improvements to it. Nordic Body Map Questionnaires is used to indicate the discomfort of the polishing working process. Rapid Entire Body Assessment (REBA) selected to provide postural analysis of observational assessment quickly and easily for whole activities (static and dynamic). Assessment of the working posture indicates a high level of risk to the value of REBA score of 9 to 10 and the action level 3, which means that it needs immediate improvement. Application simulation tools in the process showed a decrease in the level of risk shown by assessment scores REBA be 2 to 3 which indicates the level of risk is low. It can be concluded that this tool could be used as alternative solutions to reduce the risk of workplace improvements polishing process.