Processing and Manufacturing Chemicals: Tips for Workplace Safety

There are a number of safety precautions that should be taken when making bronze castings in a manufacturing facility. Read on to find out what these precautions are.

Minimise the inhalation of potentially harmful particles

Bronze is a copper alloy; as such, whilst copper serves as the main component of virtually all bronze products, they may also contain other metals, such as manganese, aluminium and tin.

When a bronze casting is being sculpted, cut or engraved with powerful machinery in a manufacturing facility, there is a risk that some of the other metal particles within the casting may become airborne. In instances where these particles contain the aforementioned manganese, this could be problematic, as frequent exposure to too much of this particular metal can put a person at risk of developing serious neurological issues, including a condition called manganism.

As such, it is important for those who own manufacturing facilities that make bronze castings to take precautions, to ensure that none of their staff members who need to cut or engrave these castings are exposed to potentially harmful particles.

There are a couple of ways to do this. Firstly, any employees who regularly perform cutting or engraving work should be provided with respirators; these respirators will drastically reduce the number of airborne particles that enter their lungs whilst they do their work.

Secondly, there should be a high-quality ventilation system in the areas of the facility where the cutting and engraving machinery are located, and this system should be serviced regularly to ensure that it does not break down. Provided it is in good working order, a ventilation system should help to extract most of the metal particles from the air before they reach the employees' lungs.

Avoid manually lifting larger bronze castings

After the bronze castings have been made, they will usually need to be transported to the packaging area of the manufacturing facility. It is very important for the owner of the facility not to allow their employees to do this manually.

The reason for this is as follows; due to the fact that larger bronze castings can be very heavy, manually carrying them from one part of the facility to another is likely to result in someone getting hurt. An employee could, for example, damage their back or their knees whilst picking up or carrying an excessively-heavy collection of castings.

Additionally, if the load they are holding is too heavy, they could drop some of the castings onto the feet of a nearby colleague and accidentally injure them.

As such, owners of these types of manufacturing facilities should actively discourage employees from manually moving bronze castings and should provide them with alternative means of performing this task (such as giving them hand trucks or forklifts to use instead).