Nearly everyday at PCM's we are instructed to use provided equitment. I work pick off for a trailer and we use rollers that clip on to the belts. When I am using the rollers as designed they block egress to the lockout buttons on the belt(my station is at the end of the belt downstream from the last button). Would this constitute a safety issue?
Any lockout/shutoff button/switch blocked by normal equipment usage is a safety issue. Do the rollers themselves block access to the area or is it packages that may fall off them?
To my knowledge pickoff positions don't have equipment that is moved, other than diverters, and the rollers are in the trailers while the pickoff has the buttons/switches below the belts where they are not interfered with by packages and can be easily hit by reaching down or swinging the knee for more advanced pickoffs.
If there is a situation where the rollers connecting to the chute from the pickoff position is actually blocking the button I would refuse to work in that area until it's fixed.
I'm trying to envision your situation, and pickoff aren't supposed to be moving so all buttons should be within reach, I can see some situations like we have in my location with out air unload where the slides to assist unloading air cans can prohibit a clear path but there is a button at every spot just not always on the side of the slide one would be used to going. Even in load situations where there's movable slides/rollers there's still a button that is either hanging above the belt within reasonable reach or underneath at the most likely location the trailer will be. In my hub there aren't switches outside the trailers for most loaders because they just leave it and the flow stops because the rollers are full which then goes up to the pickoffs who have the ability to stop the belt feeding the area.
As said, if normal equipment blocks the cutoff then it's a safety issue and contact the safety committee who will not do anything but talk about it in their monthly meeting until a member of management who knows how to write a decr alerts plant engineering of the problem, or you file a grievance and it probably takes longer than just telling the safety committee.
