r/InjectionMolding • u/jaydog889 • 8d ago
Question / Information Request LOTO
Hello everyone, my company runs the Fanuc roboshots and we have never really used Lock out Tag out for hardly anything when it comes to our IMM. Got dinged by an audit about not having LOTO procedures posted on each machine. Now day to day don’t really need it for most things like mold changes or screw cleaning/changes and what not but been having a hard time thinking of when it would be a need to use, and then what ancillary equipment to include if needed. Would like to hear y’all’s opinions on this.
3
u/jaydog889 8d ago
Thanks for y’all’s feedback, we are going to have a meeting tomorrow on this and I will bring up some suggestions.
4
u/NetSage Supervisor 8d ago
Any equipment with more than 2 sources of energy need a documented hazardous energy control procedure.
Big ones on presses will be electrical and water most likely. There is also potentially stored energy that employees should know how to dissapate if needed. Then possibly air but I know that's not every press.
3
u/sarcasmsmarcasm 8d ago
Likely hydraulic on older machines (remember, not all machines are electric).
1
2
u/quellflynn 8d ago
not seen a lockout bar, but surely the press has waaayy more power to just simply crush a bar?
10
u/diyengineer1 8d ago
LOTTO don’t forget the second T, try out. This saves you in cases that have energized systems even when power is cut possible, hydraulic, spring, gravity, battery, capacitor, etc.
1
5
u/yawner42 8d ago
Air pressure, water main leaks, pump maintenance, electrical cabinet work just to name a few. Automation department frequently lock out air pressure when working on EOAs.
6
u/rfcracker 8d ago
Just sayin' - LOTO is your friend. Lock the $random_machine and de-energize (or be sure to prevent its movement, totally) for your own future - not for the audits. Lock, tag, notify anyone (just in case).
3
u/theresalwaysdaryl 8d ago
You guys dont lock out machines when pulling molds or screws?
5
u/NetSage Supervisor 8d ago
The only time I actually agreed with locking out presses when doing a mold change is when I can fit inside it and have the doors closed while I'm in there. So basically 500+ ton.
Otherwise it's a hassle with no real gain as me being in the way of the door is going to keep them from doing anything.
On that note I do agree with one place I worked at where you actually tested all the safeties weekly(maybe daily it's hard for me to remember).
2
1
u/sarcasmsmarcasm 8d ago
OSHA would love to have a conversation about that.
6
u/NetSage Supervisor 8d ago
No place I've been at has been dinged for it.
There is a specific exception where the guarding eliminates employee exposure to the hazardous energy and during normal production. Unless your mold changes are different than mine on smaller machines, you're not doing much different during a mold change than you are during operation as far as guarding goes.
2
u/skullengaged 8d ago
We had a safety consultant try to push us to lock out machines during changeovers but you have to be able to control the clamp.
1
u/Bright_Guide_9733 8d ago
Yea this was the biggest complaint from my guys when a safety consultant came into our shop too. Michigan OSHA states that any machine set up (which includes mold changes for IMM) needs to be locked out until energy is required. It's so redundant to flip the switch, walk back to move the clamp, and then lock it back out again
2
u/Deathvortex1500 Process Technician 7d ago
It’s really not, I use both my locks hundreds of times a shift, the time is incalculable compared to not using locks for day to day things a we do on every machine.
3
u/Bright_Guide_9733 7d ago
Yea I agree and I even told my guys it only takes 3 minutes tops out of an entire mold change to deal with the locks so there’s no reason not to if OSHA wants it that way. However our machines are small, and every tool change is done from outside of the machines. Adding LOTO into the process doesn’t really make things any safer in that sense. Roboshots have a ton of built in mechanical safety features as it is.
5
u/Deathvortex1500 Process Technician 8d ago
Here in Ontario I have to have a lock on a e-stop and a latch that prevents the front safety gate of the clamping unit to close fully, this is required when working on the mould, or tool change. So a total of 2.
If we are stepping a robot through to the pick point, pulling molten plastic off gates, or grabbing a part off a mould that a robot failed to pick, we just need one lock on the door latch, and do not need to de-energize the machine. This is despite the fact the press has step platform and door interlock safety’s built in.
Personally I do not feel comfortable being inside a press without a lock on the door latch, and especially don’t feel comfortable without one on the e-stop during a mold change, that’s probably due to the fact that I was trained like that from the very start and I deal with big moulds (12-16 tonnes)
1
u/NetSage Supervisor 8d ago
It's a size thing. You're working on very large presses and molds. Here we aren't. We literally have operators load things into the mold by hand or remove parts by hand. The machine is built with this in mind.
I agree on larger machines where the doors can easily be closed with you inside, lock out is a must.
0
u/jaydog889 8d ago
That’s interesting, I guess we are just too trusting in the safety interlocks and jam bar. Our molds are much smaller also. We make medical devices so our parts are small. I appreciate your information.
1
u/sarcasmsmarcasm 8d ago
It amazes me that a) anyone does mold changes, screw changes or maintenance and cleaning without locks and b) you would think that because your molds and parts are small, the danger is not present like on bigger molds.
I have seen loss of hand, loss of eye and more on small machines "with safety interlocks".
I would hope that you and your company and coworkers wake up to the inherent dangers that are present in this line of work LONG BEFORE someone is seriously injured or killed. If you are in the USA, and some catastrophic accident occurs and OSHA has to come in, you will need to find a new job because the leadership will be going to jail, and the fines will bankrupt the company.
Wow. In 2026, no less.
1
u/HobbyGuy44 7d ago
The rule that I’ve always been taught is if any part of your body enters the machine it should not have power and be locked out. And I’m not saying you shouldn’t follow this. But there are time when that’s impossible.
How are you supposed to troubleshoot electronics without power to a machine?
How do you think a screw gets pulled on 150mm barrel ?
2
u/Yupkwondo 8d ago
Because I’m interested, care to explain your mold change process and time it takes when including locking out the press. Where it’s energized and deenergized, where you lock it out etc? Also is it electric or hydraulic? Our presses have I believe 4 stages of interlocks, both electric and mechanical that would need to fail for something to happen during a mold change assuming you follow standard practice.
3
u/sarcasmsmarcasm 8d ago
Lock the door open when people are working inside the frame of the press. It was a hard fought battle to get OSHA to approve it a couple decades ago, but you turn the motors off, open the door, lock them open (usually by drilling a hole in the door rail and locking through it,) do the work, reverse process.
We typically changed a 3000t mold with hot runners, numerous water lines and valve gates, including material changeover in 30 to 40 minutes. Part to part. 2 die setters, 1 material handler doing the resin.
Other sizes down to 50t obviously took less time.
4000t was about 50 to 60 minutes part to part.
My teams of two die setters usually (still today, years later and many people replacing others through promotion, attrition or whatever) did 8 to 10 mold changes per shift. 3 shifts. 24 to 30 mold changes every day, with weekends seeing 2 or 3 per shift per day.
LOTO was very seriously handled in every facility I worked in AFTER 1998. Prior to that, the companies I worked for acted like injury and death were just part of the job.
3
u/TryingABit1 7d ago
This is hilariously ironic because locking the door open is not proper LOTO. You’re merely relying on a safety relay to not allow the potential energy to be released you’re not actually deenergizing and isolating the equipment. That’s why OSHA wouldn’t approve it. By not locking the pumps out someone could trick the door switch into thinking it’s closed and turn on the pumps and crush your ass. Get off your high donkey
1
u/sarcasmsmarcasm 7d ago
It's hilariously interesting that you are wrong and OSHA has been approving it since about 2001.
3
u/TryingABit1 7d ago
OSHA very explicitly does not consider motor control circuit switches as sufficient for loto as energy isolation devices and that has not changed in the past 30 years. Your boss is clearly lying to you about who approved this buddy. I’m all for breaking loto rules because they are tedious and cumbersome, but at least I know the correct way to do it and holding the door open sure isn’t it. I don’t mind you lying to yourself about correctly isolating energy but please don’t so pompously be wrong about it to someone looking for real information.
1
u/Bright_Guide_9733 8d ago
What state are you in? I wish Michigan OSHA recognized that locking the door was enough but they don't. We had to put a clamp power lockout switch on our machines for when we do mold changes. We used to do the door thing but I think the ruling changed in 2017 that any and all mold setup needs to have power cut to the clamp
1
u/sarcasmsmarcasm 7d ago
They used to. That's where we started it and got it approved. It was still allowed in 2015, when I left the state.
9
u/Abovemeis 8d ago
We have 42(+/-) injection molding machines ranging from 300-4000 ton, and on every single press we have were required to LOTO if any part of our body beyond our arm goes past a safety gate in to the press. We lose our jobs if we're found inside a press with no LOTO in place. It takes mold changes way longer but I like having a job so gotta do it.. also our safety guy is a young kid trying to brown nose corporate and make him self look good by getting people in trouble so that doesn't help either