Forklift News - Dave Hoover: Forklift standards @ ITSDF.org

David Hoover is president of Forklift Training Systems Inc, a US safety company specialising in site and forklift safety training, training trainers, custom program development and cutting-edge forklift safety products. Contact David Hoover.

You rarely get anything of value free, but that is not always the case.

I had a most pleasant surprise not long ago. For those not familiar with materials handling entities in the US, the Industrial Truck Association ( ITA) is made up of representatives from major forklift manufacturers and other interested parties and promotes materials handling and safety. The ITA was a driving force behind changes in the OSHA forklift standard of the late 1990s after many years of effort and urging. Besides the OSHA standard, most forklift trainers are familiar with the ANSI or ASME standard (different names for the same standard). This standard does not carry the force of law but is sometimes referenced by OSHA in areas where the standard is silent or not fully detailed. OSHA can enforce issues not contained in the forklift standard if it feels something presents a hazard. This is enforced under the "general duty clause", under which employers must provide a workplace free from recognised hazards.

In the past, trainers had several options to obtain the standards. The first was to pay for them, but the standards were expensive, updated from time to time and there were many of them. The second option was to violate copyright, and get them from another trainer or company that had purchased them. We always paid for the standards, but never included them with our trainers’ program due to the expense involved in doing it legally. Frequently I wished I could have emailed a copy to someone or put them in a binder for a client, but it was neither legal nor ethical to do so. However, due to co-operative efforts from the ITA and the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) the standards are now available free from the Industrial Truck Standards Development Foundation (ITSDF), which is funded by the ITA.

Eleven standards are free at www.ITSDF.org. Whether you are a trainer in the US or not, these are excellent guidelines for forklift safety and contain a tremendous amount of professionally written technical and safety material. Most people will be most interested in the ANSI/ITSDF B56.1 Safety Standard for Low and High Lift Trucks, but there is far more to see.

In my next article I will expand in greater detail on what types of information you can find in the standard and why it is of such great value. If you find the information valuable, I suggest you support the ITSDF by making a contribution on their web site. It is polite to tip for good service and this is the best deal in the world.

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