Hi Ken,
I guess I wonder why everything has to be designed to the lowest common denominator. In your ideal world, every piece of equipment would have to be up to medical standards and worthy of a child operating it without any training with no risk for injury.
The cost of making a piece of equipment like that is exceedingly high (I know this because we manufacture parts for GE Medical technologies), yet most adults can deal with the education nessesary to use equipment as it is designed to use. The heat press design is not flawed (it happens to work just fine), it was the training or education of the person using the press that was. Making every piece of equipment 100% risk free is unrealistic. The thing that makes up for that reality is that as humans we can learn to not make mistakes that put us in harms way. To make a mistake in the operation of a piece of equipment and then blame the equipment design for your error seems wrong to me.
I guess I would ask since David smashed his finger in a car door (a point he made in the first post) did he write a letter to the manufacturer of the automobile that he smashed his finger in asking them to re-design the door, or did he just move on with his life watching his fingers when he closed doors thereafter? Why would this situation be any different? In your "ideal" scenario, any possible way a person could get hurt would be considered a design flaw in need of fixing or some warning label.
Regarding the likeness of different automobiles to different pieces of equipment.....Automobiles are made to be similar in operation one to another to avoid the kind of training you would find necessary in dealing with a new piece of production equipment. When I was talking about a press operator in a prior post, I meant offset press operator. New printing equipment has to be handled differently than old. You can't just step in and assume you know how to handle it safely without knowing how it works. It is definitely not the same as getting into different car and having to be trained on it.
I am not suggesting that manufacturers stop trying to make safe equipment because theirs is "safe enough". I surely don't feel as if you should blame the manufacturer for a poor design prior to contacting them on a public forum, when a good percentage of the blame (if not all) should rest on your own shoulders.
The society we live in wants to blame everyone else for it's problems. People need to take responsibility for their actions, and or inaction instead of painting themselves as "the victim" all the time. There is a cute internet circulation addressing this and the kids of the 50-70's talking about how in spite of leaded paint, lack of seatbelt laws, etc.... and all the daily hazzards we went through as kids, we still somehow made it to adulthood intact that rings true to me.
Doug had several excellent examples of certain types of equipment that are impossible to make 100% perfectly safe. They do what they can, but there needs to be a shred of common sense used when operating such equipment. I look at the heat press in the same light. To me it was clear where the handles were just by looking at the picture. Yes a sticker would be a nice warning, but you would think that someone would use common sense and find the handles, or at least have a look at the manual if they have never used a press with a design like this before.
I have re-stated myself a few times here now. I am discouraged that Harvey sees this as an attack on David. I happen to like David but also feel he needs to know when he is wrong. I see nothing wrong with a discussion about why things are the way they are. If my statements were taken as an attack on David.....They weren't meant that way. They were meant as an observation as to why I think the injury took place.
I hope that Davids finger heals well and he can move on from this traumatic experience. As I said before, I am quite certain that he learned a painful lesson, and fully expect he wouldn't make the same mistake twice.
Brian G. |