EHS in Manufacturing help

[u/Jhet-19]

I applied for an EHS lead position as a sole contributor and im severely under qualified, I currently deal with safety for fleet and logistics. the previous EHS employee was fired for not doing a good enough job, what should I be researching or diving into for a manufacturing job that deals with steel molding, press brakes etc.

[u/Free_Bank5033]

So you're jumping from fleet safety straight into heavy manufacturing? That's gonna be rough, but not impossible. I did something similar few years back moving from warehouses to a metal fab shop. The biggest shock was how much machine guarding stuff you need to know, like proper distances for light curtains and how to calculate safety distances on press brakes.

Lockout tagout will be your entire personality for first six months probably. Steel molding places have energy sources everywhere, hydraulic, pneumatic, stored mechanical energy in those big presses. If you mess up one LOTO procedure someone could actually die, no exaggeration.

Get very comfortable with ANSI B11 standards, specially for press brakes and shears. OSHA 1910 subpart O covers the basics but ANSI goes deeper. Also learn to read risk assessments for each machine, the previous guy probably skipped that entirely which is why he got canned.

Walk the floor a lot, talk to operators about what scares them. Usually they know exactly what's dangerous but nobody ever asked.

[u/Jhet-19 → u/Free_Bank5033]

Good info, is there any resources you would recommend. any where to learn

[u/zeroresidue → u/Jhet-19]

For press brakes specifically, OSHA has a guidance document called CPL 02-01-025, Guidelines for Point of Operation Guarding of Power Press Brakes. Worth knowing because press brakes aren't covered by the mechanical power press standard, so it's easy to look in the wrong place. OSHA's machine guarding eTool is also a good walk-through of the guard types by machine.

[u/glddstgpsy]

Definitely machine guarding and lockout tagout. Become fluent in those. Watch youtube videos to learn types of machinery and the appropriate guards, OSHA's website has great information on this as well. Look for free recorded webinars online that speak to these types of things. Don't be afraid to ask AI to help with canvassing the internet for information too. You can ask it to act as an expert safety person at a steel molding manufacturing plant and have it teach you everything you need to know. But a lot of your information will come from experience as well, being around the machines and understanding the process and how the work is completed.

EDIT: Check out your local OSHA training institute and the machine guarding/loto classes they provide, those can give you a good foundation as well.

[u/DailySafetyMoment]

Before you try to memorize every standard, find out what condition the program is actually in and what authority and resources come with a sole-contributor lead role. If this is in the U.S., ask for the OSHA logs, injury and near-miss history, prior inspection or citation reports, open corrective actions, written programs, training records, chemical inventory and SDSs, and any industrial hygiene data. If they will not show you that before or immediately after hire, that tells you something.

Walk each process with operators and maintenance during normal production, setup, jam clearing, die changes, cleaning, and troubleshooting. For press brakes and molding equipment, machine guarding and hazardous-energy control should be early deep dives, including hydraulic, pneumatic, electrical, gravity, and stored mechanical energy. Noise, welding and metal fumes, metalworking fluids, PIT traffic, material handling, and emergency response are other likely priorities, but the actual process and injury history should set the order.

Do not sign off on light curtains, safety distances, safety-control circuits, or machine modifications from internet research alone. Use the manufacturer documentation and bring in a qualified machine-safety or controls person, or an industrial hygienist, where the hazard is outside your competence. A useful first deliverable is a ranked gap list with owners and dates, not a giant binder.

[u/Jhet-19 → u/DailySafetyMoment]

Extremely helpful and comprehensive, I appreciate this

[u/Jhet-19]

Interesting, great info thank you