Commercial and Industrial
ICCL PAD - Integrated Communications Cap Lamp - Personnel Alert Device
By
Mine Site Technologies Pty Limited - Stuart McLean
PAD by Tiller Design - Steve Hill
Alarm Unit by OSD (Outerspace Design Group) - Mario Simeon & Tim Gamble
Description
The PAD is the latest communications addition to MST’s renowned ICCL, providing Proximity Detection/ Collision Avoidance technology enhancing safety for the pedestrian within the Australian underground mining sector. The PAD operates in concert with the SPS HazardAvert™ system to provide warning and alarms to both pedestrians and machine operators. The PAD detects the strength of magnetic fields emanating from generators on machines. As field strength is proportional to distance, boundaries can be set and once exceeded, the PAD will alarm and radio the hazard back to the operator including the ability to stop machinery without intervention by an operator.
Key Features
and/or Benefits
The PAD (Personal Alert Device) is a 2 part system, dedicated in its design and packaging, to be a field retrofit for existing ICCL (Integrated Communications Cap Lamp) users. The system comprises a primary housing which fits onto the ICCL containing processors, safety circuits and a transceiver which acts upon earth penetrating magnetic flux signals (sees around corners/ through materials) and responds with message/ state transmissions within the UHF band. In addition, is an Alarm Unit which is also a field retrofit to ICCL’s LED headpiece. The alarm device provides both audio and optical indication as to a hazard.
The PADs primary role is to detect, warn and report proximity relative to machinery and or plant. It can define 5 specific (distance) zones, from millimetres to 30 metres, around a hazard and provides a unique audible and optical warning pattern for each zone. It can operate in concert with 100’s of other PADs amongst any variety and number of machines. It has the ability to automatically stop machines, override a failed system for extraction etc. The Alarm Unit is also provided with a Lens that penetrates the brim of any helmet to direct the optical warning towards the user.
Mining is a rugged and hostile environment where equipment entering this world has to be ready for the abuse and the restrictions/ requirements imposed upon equipment operating in hazardous atmospheres. The circuit design offers both thermal and spark reduction techniques commensurate with the requirements of intrinsically safe apparatus. In Australia the product is certified for use in hazardous areas (Ex ia, Group 1, Zone 0) thus permissible for use in Mines susceptible to firedamp (methane). The product also exceeds the mechanical requirements of such standards with regards to impact, drops, flammability, strain, static discharge, thermal differentials and ingression protection.
Though we are out to increase safety and minimise injury within an industry, the product needs to be embraced and accepted by users without compromising or interfering with their daily tasks, processes and/or procedures. The easiest way for them to embrace a new product is for it to be effectively invisible until they need it. In developing the product, with the understanding of the above, the size, weight and usage of the existing product it fits upon is virtually unchanged. Safety related design techniques, watch dogs and a host of failure tolerant mechanisms are all in play to provide safety.
Fitment of the PAD is like a glove for ICCL. Any existing ICCL simply slips into the PAD housing. Tangs and discrete locking mechanisms fasten the PAD within the primary mechanical envelope of the ICCL. A cable carrying power, battery charge status and alarm signals simply folds over and connects to the power take off port on the ICCL and a dedicated fully moulded Cap Lamp Lead carries power and alarm signals up to the headpiece. In minimizing impact and reducing real estate usage, additional circuits are overmoulded within the cabling to the headpiece providing power failure detection.
