Author: christopher Harper

Ergonomic Mobile Applications

We recently read about a mobile app that was designed to help improve ergonomics in the workplace. With this app, people can see photos different postures that might lead to injury at work and get information on ways to improve posture as well as learn about exercises they can do at work to reduce injury. This is a great way to increase awareness about the importance of correct posture.

However, before the term “app” was used to refer to programs created for mobile devices, it was part of word “application.” And for some people, a mobile app will not be enough to reduce injury in the workplace but a mobile application that they can use as they complete their work tasks can make all the difference.

A DJ Products Industrial Power Mover can eliminate the strain of manually pulling heavy products, parts carts and wheeled equipment. Our material handling solutions or “mobile apps” can also eliminate bulky, expensive lift trucks.

Our CartCaddy power movers comes in many different shapes and sizes to handle wheeled applications that operate with racks, carts, and casters. They are designed to move with employees so they do not have to overexert themselves to push or pull in ways that can damage the musculoskeletal system.

If you have seen a number of workers who need to go on disability due to injuries that relate to ergonomic issues, isn’t it time to apply a different kind of material handling solution?

Call us at 1-800-686-2651 so we can help you find material handling solutions that fit your workplace.

Get Ergonomic Material Handling Solutions and Work With Machines Safely

We have a tendency to separate ourselves from the mechanical inventions we use to assist us with work in a ‘man vs. machine’ fashion. Often we forget that the human body is also a remarkable machine but if you mistreat it, you can pay a heavy price. This is why DJ Products designs material handling solutions to change the way you move equipment. We make our products to move in concert with the mechanisms of the human body to eliminate the strains and pains of manually pushing or pulling heavy carts and other equipment.

And while we cannot completely eliminate the strains of the costs of running a business, we do work to make our products less costly than traditional electric equipment.

Some of our solutions include:

Ergonomic Material Handling Electric Carts for Industrial Use

• Carts with casters
• Carts with 4-swivel casters or wagon-wheel style of turning
• Carts in a straight line
• Platform Trucks & Scissor Lifts

Ergonomic Material Handling Carts for Hospitals and the Hospitality Industry
• Hospital carts
• Pulling heavy soiled linen carts
• Maneuvering clean linen metro wire carts
• Pushing stainless steel food carts
• Ergonomic powered flatbed supply carts
• Ergonomic electric flatbed carts for hauling medical supplies and records

Car Equipment Pushers and Trailer Movers for the Automotive Industry
• Car Pusher
• Trailer Mover, Puller, Pusher

Our maneuverable ergonomic material handling solutions may be smaller and lighter than what you are used to so If you need help selecting products, don’t hesitate to call us at 800-686-2651 and one of our Sales Engineers will be more than happy to assist you.

GM Uses a Hologram to Examine Ergonomic Issues

General Motors has a global manager for ergonomics and The Journal Gazette of Fort Wayne recently published and article stating that General Motors will spend $275 million in its state to build newer versions of some of its most popular vehicles. They added the interesting fact that “GM uses a three-dimensional hologram of an average worker to evaluate whether certain tasks in the assembly process are too demanding.”

You may not have global operations or one person in charge of ergonomics as GM does but you will likely need to consider some of the same questions that GM does.

• How far do your operators need to reach to perform work tasks?
• Can we afford to spend money to hire and train new workers if current employees suffer injuries?
• What would be the average cost of a worker’s compensation claim for our company? How will that affect our financial outlook?
• How can we make sure that our workers stay safe as they age?

Here at DJ Products, Inc. we specialize in finding electric or motorized cart tug solutions that either:
• Eliminate the strains and pains of manually pushing or pulling heavy carts, equipment, or materials.
• Are less costly, smaller, and more maneuverable then traditional electric equipment used for moving carts and equipment; like forktrucks, walkies, or motorized riding tugs.

You do not have to sacrifice your employee’s wellbeing to make your products or meet quotas. There are ergonomic material handling solutions that can get the job done. Call us at 800-686-2651 and a Sales Engineer will help you pinpoint the right application for you.

Ergonomically Designed Tugs Let You Transport Large Equipment

Our material handling solutions are compact, battery powered “walk behind” units that can help people transport heavy loads with control in numerous situations. Whether you have plenty of room in which to maneuver or you need to move something within a tight, difficult space, we may have an electric or motorized cart tug that can help. You would be surprised at how the proper design makes it possible for a little machine to allow you to move something very heavy. The machine does not need to be as big as or larger than the object being moved when it is engineered properly.

Airplanes?
Yes, you can move an airplane with our aircraft tug. And when we say you, we mean that you can complete this task on your own using the power of our aircraft tug.

Vehicles?
Our car pusher and trailer movers can move vehicles and pieces of equipment with that have straight wheels or are on a rail.

Dumpsters?
Most people wouldn’t try to move an airplane, alone but they might consider themselves strong enough to push a dumpster…what they don’t factor in is the strain this can cause. Just because you can do it doesn’t mean that you should do it. A DJ Products dumpster mover can help you avoid unnecessary muscle strain and pain.

At DJ Products, our goal is to provide solutions for material handling solutions that are ergonomically correct, safe, and cost effective. If you are wondering just how one of our products can help you, feel free to call us at 800-686-2651 and talk to one of our Sales Engineers.

Avoid Employee Injury with Industrial Tuggers

A number of recent studies show that workers do not stay home if they are sick because they cannot afford to take time off. Even if workers have paid sick days, they are often afraid to use this time because they do not want their companies to question their dedication.

This same phenomenon occurs when workers are injured on the job. Some injuries are serious and reporting them cannot be avoided. However, The Midwest Disability Blog reported on a study of construction workers found that workers are not likely to report on-the-job injuries:

“Despite being eligible to obtain workers’ compensation benefits for a work-related injury, a new study performed by researchers from Duke University Medical Center, the Chicago Regional Council of Carpenters and the Carpenters District Council of Great St. Louis and Vicinity revealed that more than 30 percent of injuries sustained by carpenters are not reported or rarely reported.”

Some workers fear being punished or pressured to not report an injury, and some even fear being fired for alerting management if they sustain an injury at work.

Although the study examined the practices of union carpenters, researchers felt that “the problem most likely included all types of workers and added that “the problem of not reporting injuries is a larger issue than what was revealed in the study.”

Whatever your workplace policy regarding reporting injuries may be, it is best to avoid employee injury altogether. Ergonomic material handling solutions can help your employees avoid injury. We manufacture power movers and industrial tuggers that eliminate the pain and strain of manual pulling heavy carts and wheeled equipment.

Ergonomic Carts a Natural for Health Care Industry

Health care may be one of the few bright spots in the American economy. With the Baby Boomers just beginning to enter the age of aches and pains (otherwise known as retirement), the health care industry is expected to be booming for some decades to come. Health care jobs top the list of most employment recruiters and are drawing huge numbers of future workers to training programs. No job is recession-proof, but health care comes close.

What’s interesting is that the Boomers lining up for treatment also comprise the largest number of current health care workers. The poor economy has encouraged many nurses, aides and other health care workers to forego retirement and remain on the job. The flexible and part-time schedules available in many segments of the health care industry have made it possible for workers to balance work responsibilities with the need to care for children, aging parents or a disabled spouse, further increasing the average age of experienced health care workers. The aging of the health care workforce means for hospitals, nursing homes, assisted living centers and other health care employers must accommodate the changing physical needs of their workers.

Ergonomically-designed powered carts allow workers of any age or size to easily accomplish necessary tasks without risk of the often debilitating musculoskeletal injuries that can occur from pushing and pulling heavy carts. A national leader in the design and manufacture of ergonomic motored carts and tugs, DJ Products offers several carts specifically designed to navigate crowded hospital corridors and maneuver in cramped hospital rooms.

  • Housekeeping Cart. Eliminates strain from pushing heavy carts filled with cleaning supplies or linens.
  • Dirty Linen Cart. Eliminates pain and muscle strain from maneuvering heavy soiled linens through rooms and hallways.
  • Clean Linen Wire Cart. Has wire shelves for stacking clean linens or moving supplies without straining.

Visit the DJ Products’ website to see our complete line of ergonomic motorized carts and tugs.

Ignoring Ergonomics Can Lead to Injury

We discussed “The Scientific Roots and Business Applications of Ergonomics” to give you some background on this topic and help you to understand why employers need to think of ergonomics as more than a buzzword; it is a useful science that can make your workplace more productive and profitable. DJ Products designs material handling solutions that are not simply designed to get the job done or move objects from one place to another; they are designed to help your employees avoid painful injuries as they do their work.

The injuries that result from ignoring ergonomics are very real. Some can take an employee away from work immediately; others result in wear and tear over time and gradually make it more difficult for employees to complete tasks.

These kinds of injuries are caused not just by repetitive motions but also by forceful motion, which Empowher.com defines as including “actions like lifting things that are too heavy, working on bolts that are rusted on, or a squeezing motion that is too frequent for comfort or too hard for the hand.”

Here are some of the conditions you can help your employees to avoid:

Lumbar (lower back) injuries– “caused by bending, lifting, pulling, pushing and twisting improperly.”

Tennis elbow– the elbow becomes painfully inflamed after the forearm has been repeatedly rotated with too much force or too often

Rotator cuff injury – it becomes painful to move the shoulder and arthritis may result from repeated arm movements, especially repeated use of the arms over the head

Tendinitis– various joints become painfully inflamed because of bad posture and repetitive movements

Ergonomic Carts Can Help Struggling Hospitality Industry

Staycations and a sharp decline in business travel during the recession have pushed the U.S. hospitality industry to the edge. In recession for the past 24 months, overall occupancy rates continue to erode despite a slight seasonal uptick in June. Occupancy rates at U.S. hotels, motels and resorts have been falling even more rapidly than before over the past eight weeks and the immediate future doesn’t look good, according to industry watcher Hotelmarketing.com.

Continued concern about family finances and potential job loss have kept families at home. Group travel is down, and tours are being cancelled for failure to meet minimums. Businesses have cut travel to hold the line on expenses. Convention and trade show attendance is down. Hotels and motels are competing for a narrowing traveler pool that has forced many to cut staff until the economy improves and the hospitality industry rebounds.

Savvy hoteliers are turning to ergonomically-designed hospitality carts that allow a single employee to accomplish a greater workload with less physical effort. Ergonomic design eliminates strains and pains that workers can develop from pushing heavy laundry, cleaning and linen carts at hotels, motels, casinos and resorts. Powered housekeeping carts and clean and dirty linen carts allow a single employee to safely manage heavy loads of linens or cleaning supplies.

Powered platform carts and electric carts allow easy and safe movement of supplies, materials, parts or machinery from one area of a facility to another. Compact design permits operators to easily and safely maneuver carts through heavily traveled hotel corridors and narrow behind-the-scenes hallways. Motorized dump hoppers makes trash removal a breeze.

DJ Products, the national leader in the manufacture of ergonomic motorized carts and tugs, offers a full line of material handling products designed to meet the needs of the hospitality industry. Our motorized cart retro kit can be adapted and installed on any cart to increase safety and productivity. Visit the DJ Products website for more information.

A Powered Carpet Dolly Helps Get the Job Done

If your business involves moving large carpets or similar objects that are heavy and cylindrical, you could probably use some help if your employees have been shouldering the burden of moving these things on their own. A power carpet dolly from DJ Products can load and move an object that is up to 1000 pounds. How is this possible? Its unique tilt and power forward action allows this to happen.

The CarpetCaddy powered carpet dolly has a conveyor lip that you can tilt forward to meet the carpet’s edge. The operator can then slowly move the CarpetCaddy forward while at the same time operating the conveyor backwards. The carpet’s weight will level out so that it rests on the CarpetCaddy and is ready to be moved. A similar set of actions in which the operator almost reverses the previous steps will unload the carpet at its desired location.

Notice we mentioned a single “operator” in the previous steps. This powered carpet dolly makes the loading of a carpet roll, a mat, or a rug from a warehouse to the jobsite an effortless job for one person. Traditionally 2 or 3 individuals would be needed to load a heavy carpet roll on their back or on a cart or dolly. This will not only allow installations and other work that involves moving carpet to process faster, it will also reduce the chances that one or more of your employees will get injured transporting carpet. During a typical carpet removal or installation, there are ample instances where someone might twist the wrong muscle, hurt their back or do some other physical damage that would require time to heal.

Improve Health and Safety with the DJ Products Ergonomic Load Calculator

Sometimes older people shake their heads at the thought that many students are allowed to use calculators in school these days. And for their part, some young people ask why they have to learn how to do certain mathematical calculations without a calculator since once they leave school, they will be free to use calculators whenever they want.

At DJ Products, we know that there are some equations and problems that cannot be solved by someone counting on their fingers or making a “guesstimation.” When it comes to workplace safety, you want to make sure that you are examining the numbers and the factors as accurately as possible.

This is why we offer the DJ Products Ergonomic Load Calculator on our website. The calculator is designed to estimate the amount of horizontal force necessary to move loads (on wheels) using inputs from particular workplace environments. It doesn’t just look at numbers in isolation; the calculator will combine conditions related to the state of the “vehicle health”, floor condition, terrain and footing as well as the weight of the load being moved in estimating these forces.

When you use our ergonomic load calculator, you also input variables about the worker who is supposed to perform a certain task. In order to generate an ergonomic estimate of his much force a single worker should apply, it is important to consider that person as an individual. Ergonomic calculators and computer programs that attempt to give you this information using information for an average worker can miss the mark and when it comes to your workers ability to get the job done, you do not want to use miscalculated information.

If you use the DJ Products Ergonomic Load Calculator and want to discuss material handling solutions that might be of benefit to your workers, call us at 1-800-686-2651.