Safety standards for machinery undergoing major overhauls

Rapid development of sophisticated control systems for machinery engenders an array of new safety standards that designers must meet. Major revisions already are underway on machinery safety guidelines adopted by the European Committee for Standardization (CEN) in 1996 and updated into an international standard in 1999. That standard deals largely with definitions of safety-related parts and identification of risks in control systems. "It was clear from the response of designers that they required the standard to deal with all of the aspects of the control system," says Paul Makin. He is chairman of the technical committee on machinery safety at the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). ISO and CEN committees are completely revising the current international standard on control system safety, ISO 13841:1999. ISO, meanwhile, is offering designers a guide for applying machinery safety standards. Send an e-mail to [email protected] and request ISO/TR 13849-100. The International Social Security Association is holding a seminar for lecturers and safety experts who train designers in machinery safety. It will be November 29 and 30, 2001 in Strasbourg, France. For more information e-mail [email protected].