Simplify safety design

As the business case for incorporating automation safety into manufacturing equipment becomes more embraced, equipment manufacturers are looking to keep pace with the growing sophistication of machinery and automation technologies. Safety systems - when designed and engineered to match contemporary machinery performance - involve highly complex functions. As a result, the design process itself can be a barrier to efficiency, continuous improvement and confidence in safety solutions.

Figure 1: The SAB tool guides users through the design process by providing options for layout and product selection using Allen-Bradley safety automation products.

Designing a machinery safety system can be an arduous process that involves printing machinery-layout drawings, drawing hard and movable guarding and identifying potentially hazardous access points. In addition, it involves identifying required safety functions, selecting safety input, output and logic devices, and calculating the achieved performance level (PL).

At the end, you’ll likely find yourself with a lengthy handwritten list of required materials and safety calculations that need to be transferred into documents, drawings and reports.

Despite the depth of innovative automation used in the manufacturing industry, the safety design process traditionally has been a relatively manual undertaking.

Two free tools - the Safety Automation Builder (SAB) configuration software and Safety Functions pre-engineered design documents - help automate and shorten this process.

Link to safety functions and more

The SAB tool, available to download, guides users through the design process by providing options for layout, safety PL analysis (based on ISO 13849-1 using IFA’s SISTEMA tool) and product selection using Allen-Bradley safety automation products.

Figure 2: The Safety Automation Builder software tool enables users to import an image of machinery and answer questions using a drop-down menu and help screens to identify and select the necessary safeguards.

It also can automate the selection process to speed system design and minimise human error. The tool asks users to import an image of machinery and answer questions using a drop-down menu and help screens to identify and select the necessary safeguards. It will then compile all product selections, generate a bill of materials and gather the necessary data to populate SISTEMA. SISTEMA then indicates the attained PL of the safety system using ISO 13849-1 through an automatic calculation. As part of the process, users will receive a SISTEMA project file.

Rockwell Automation worked with Dan Pienta, president of Automatic Handling International, a Machine Builder Partner in the Rockwell Automation PartnerNetwork, on a beta-test version of the SAB tool. He found the bill of materials functionality particularly useful, because it helped him automatically navigate through the wide variety of device types available. “Anything we can do to open up the (machine engineering) funnel (to speed engineering time) is good,” he says.

After going through the SAB process, users can link to the Safety Functions - pre-engineered design documents containing detailed information for each safeguarding method, including specific functionality, PL and required input, logic and output components. These documents include parts lists, electrical drawings, a SISTEMA project file, and verification and validation plans. Users can select the appropriate Safety Function needed for a particular machine and combine it with the bill of materials to design a complete safety system. The first six Safety Functions are now available.

To learn more about these tools, visit Rockwell Automation Safety Automation Builder.