Evaluation of the NAGCAT tractor guidelines

Details

• Personal Author:
  Berg RL ; Chang JH ; Fathallah FA ; Marlenga B ; Meyers JM ; Miles JA ; Miller BL ; Pickett W
• Description:
  This study aims to build upon the North American Guidelines for Children's Agricultural Tasks (NAGCAT) project by providing a field test of the NAGCAT tractor guidelines. Several tractor dealers and farmers offered their tractors for the study in California and Wisconsin; for a total of 86 tractors. A unique photographic technique provided 3-D digital mock-ups of the tractors, which facilitated the evaluation of reach and visual abilities of adolescents using anthropometric data. Force requirements were captured using a digital force gauge and compared to existing force requirements and databases. The results indicate, in general, that hand-operated controls tend to be out of reach for both genders with the exception of steering wheels. The worst controls were hand throttle levers. On the other hand, foot-operated controls yielded higher reachable percentages for both genders, while steering wheels showed a medium range of reachable percentages. In general, youth operators showed relatively restricted fields of vision compared to the adults, and their fields of vision decreased as obstacles were closer to the tractor. The results also showed that foot-operated controls require more strength than the recommended levels. In the meantime, the recommended physical strengths of children surpassed the activation forces for hand-operated controls. This result suggests that youth operators would be very likely exposed to muscle fatigue in the leg due to the frequent use of foot clutches and brakes during tractor operation. The study showed that the demarcation of the NAGCAT by the size of the tractor is not significant for the majority of controls. [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Agriculture Ergonomics Manufacturing And Industrial Facilities Musculoskeletal System Occupational Health Risk Assessment Safety
• Keywords:
  Adolescents Agricultural-industry Agricultural-machinery Agricultural-workers Author Keywords: Ergonomics Children Equipment-operators Machine-operators Physiological-measurements Posture Quantitative-analysis Risk-analysis Safety Tractors Work-analysis

  More +
• Publisher:
  American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Grant
• Genre:
  Proceedings
• Place as Subject:
  California ; Minnesota ; OSHA Region 5 ; OSHA Region 9 ; Wisconsin
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20039853
• Citation:
  2007 ASABE Annual International Meeting, June 17-20, 2007, Minneapolis, Minnesota. St. Joseph, MI: American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers, 2007 Jun; :075008
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2007
• Performing Organization:
  University of California, Davis
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• Start Date:
  20030801
• Source Full Name:
  2007 ASABE Annual International Meeting, June 17-20, 2007, Minneapolis, Minnesota
• End Date:
  20070731
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:73a74875ab896792d7794b06a5dde5a58bc5ea8f362e364f67e6053dd8c12c95a498be36f84f974919d307d92f780f7053e33e9a26ee30918035fbf0fa8e999f
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/192922/cdc_192922_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 170.83 KB ]