Lifting Gear Vs Manpower

Sep 9
16:45

2011

Nikki Dale

Nikki Dale

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Why buy lifting equipment when manpower can do a similar job? This really is a great question that will be explored in this post.

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There are countless reasons why the use of lifting equipment greatly outweighs the use of manpower alone regarding lifting big,Lifting Gear Vs Manpower Articles heavy and cumbersome loads, probably the most significant reason is the safety factors which may have an effect on any personnel who lift any load, large or small, or even when they just work within a place where loads are lifted. This is for the reason that all businesses should provide a safe working environment for their personnel by law , and in today’s current environment where suing claims are high it is going to be a major issue for all employers to make sure that everything possible is done to protect employees and thus themselves.

The safety elements of using a lifting gear device far outweighs the advantages of manpower alone. It is common knowledge that lifting any object in an incorrect manner can lead to possible injury, the most often seen are neck and back related. Utilised in the approved manner a lifting device will cause no strain over the human skeleton because the device used will take the weight of the load and in some cases manouevre it , so there will be little risk of injury.

One of the other questions often raised is the cost of purchasing lifting gear devices Against hiring additional manpower. An employee will incur expenses of their basic wages and perhaps pension contributions etc. A lifting device will have the purchasing cost as well as possible running and repair costs, which are often minimal depending on the kind of lifting device  chosen, however other considerations need to be taken into consideration; what if the employee is sick, maybe long-term; this can incur costs of sick pay as well as losing that persons manpower whilst they are not working, resulting in less productivity, and so costing even more money as a result of deadlines not being met or needing to employ extra staff. Imagine if the worker suffers an injury, lifting at work, not only will you incur the costs mentioned above there may be also the possibility of a claim against you for insufficient safety, these payouts might be huge. Can you afford the risk?

An added benefit of utilizing a lifting device is that they can lift objects that would otherwise be impossible for a human to lift.

Manpower does have one main advantage over the use of a lifting gear device, this is their diversity, individuals can typically perform a variety of tasks whilst a lifting device will probably be more limited. However this benefit will hugely depend on the task or tasks that are required and the lifting device chosen.

In conclusion it would appear that in general, due to the safety implications a properly utilised piece of lifting equipment will outweigh manpower alone.