White Papers for Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA)

OSHA North American safety Standards

Light curtain standards fall into two categories: application standards and construction standards.
Application standards reference how to use a light curtain for machine guarding, for example, how to calculate the safe mounting distance. Although some may give condensed construction information,
often the main thrust of an application standard is how to apply a light curtain for the type of machine covered by the standard.
For example, ANSI/RIA R15.06 discusses the use of presencesensing devices (light curtains) for robot guarding. ANSI B11.1 provides information on how to use presence-sensing devices on mechanical power presses.
Construction standards provide design, construction and testing information on presence sensing devices. There are currently no construction standards developed in North America and IEC61496, an IEC standard entitled “Safety of Machinery - Electrosensitive Protective Equipment” is generally accepted as the default.
IEC61496 covers specific items such as the number of outputs required, the need for a keyoperated
switch, transformer construction, and failure conditions.
Test specifications require that the equipment be subject to a battery of tests including moisture and dust intrusion, power supply transients, electrical interferences, electrostatic discharges, component failure mode analysis and object sensing capabilities.

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