There some ingenious devices to make life easier, safer and more profitable. NSS asked companies that supply the products to the stone industry to outline their benefits. Here is what some of them said...  

Stone is often awkwardly large and awkwardly heavy. Depending what it is being used for, it can also be awkwardly shiny and slippery. Yet there are still many companies doing little to make the movement of materials through their workshops and on to sites easier and safer.

Perhaps once there was some excuse for that because there were not many products available. But these days there is a wide range of often ingenious products to help with all kinds of handling and storing of stone. It is seldom expensive and could avoid life-changing injuries, lost production time, damaged work and fines and compensation, not to mention the attention of the Health & Safety Executive.

So why don’t more companies invest in it?

Of course, more companies are investing in it all the time. It is why there are so many products to choose from. But simple little solutions to handling stone don’t attract as much attention as the latest CNC machinery does. It just is not as sexy.

But perhaps it should be. Getting the logistics of moving products through a factory and around a site can have as much of an impact on the bottom line as using the latest all-singing-all-dancing CNC machinery.

And it is not soft to want to make life easier and safer for yourself and those you work alongside, either. Especially when it is difficult enough to recruit people into the industry and those already in it are getting older.

The Health & Safety Executive (HSE) has been concentrating a lot on the dangers of dust and vibration injuries associated with the use of tools in the past few years. Understandably, because a lot of masons suffer from white finger and some die prematurely of silicosis – the reality of which you can discover first hand from people who have it at bit.ly/stone-silicosis. HSE has videoed an interview with a stone worker who has contracted silicosis and there is a harrowing written account of its more advanced stages from a mason who has since died of it.

But that is at the extreme end of the spectrum. Most injuries are fairly minor. About a quarter that result in more than seven days off work are the result of slips and trips and about a third from handling materials. While they might not change lives long-term, they can be distressing, disrupt production and result in the loss of expensive finished product. They might also lead to an injury claim by an employee and a hike in your insurance premiums.

The first step to avoiding slips and trips is to clear up and clean. Get rid of the clutter. Make sure there is nothing to trip over and no sludge to slip on. It is a job that can easily be put off if the boss isn’t bothered but it is the cause of so many accidents.

Then arrange work so that everyone is within their comfort zone. That means they are not struggling to lift anything that is too heavy for them nor stretching to place it on awkward machine tables, bankers, racks or pallets.

The best way of avoiding injuries associated with moving stone is to move it as little as possible, which means thinking about the flow of work through the factory. When stone is moved it should be moved mechanically as much as possible, using a gantry, pillar (or jib) crane, or with a boom or eye on a fork lift truck. A vacuum lift, kaiman, scissor lift or some other device for grabbing the stone is needed. And if people must transport stone, trollies, dollies, carts and frames can all be used so the stone does not have to be lifted from one station to another and to and from storage areas.

The storage areas themselves should be well organised and contain frames and shelves for stone and finished work, making it easily accessible, again without stretching or standing in the danger zone of where the stone can fall if anything goes wrong.

There will be more about materials handling at the SHAD (safety & health awareness day) being held in Leicester on 19 April. Demand for places has been so high that there will be two sessions, one in the morning (registration from 9am) and one in the afternoon (registration from 1pm), with a sandwich lunch in between for both groups. There are more details at bit.ly/SFGB-SHAD. It might be fully booked by now, but if you want to check, email sandra@stonefed.org.uk.

The SHAD is being organised by Stone Federation Great Britain in conjunction with the Health & Safety Executive. It is free for Federation members and £10 to anyone else, but you have to register (not just turn up on the day) as places are restricted.

 And if you can’t get to this event, let Sandra at Stone Federation know you are interested anyway as there will be other SHADs in other parts of the country on other dates.

There are plenty of suppliers of materials handling equipment to choose from. Many of the machinery suppliers have their favourite brands – D Zambelis sells Abaco; Stone Equipment International and Combined Masonry Supplies sell Weha; Omni Cubed has just signed a major European distribution deal with LPE Group and is also sold in the UK by Stonegate and CDUK (the company that sells DuPont Corian); Waters Group supplies Aardwolf and Konig; Stonegate now has exclusivity on Hercules lifting and handling products. There are more, including plenty of companies all over the country supplying cranes of various kinds and steel fabricators who are happy to make racks to your specification.

We asked the major suppliers to the stone industry if they had any developments in materials handling to tell the industry about. Their responses are reported below.

Let’s start with LPE Group, which is on the cover of this edition of Natural Stone Specialist. Carl Sharkey and Simon Bradbury, who run LPE Group, are just back from America with an agreement to represent Omni Cubed materials handling products exclusively on mainland Europe.

LPE Group has been selling Omni Cubed materials handling products through LPE Tooling, a separate company it formed to expand its supply of tools, consumables and handling products.

It launched a catalogue of the products it offers at the Natural Stone Show in London last year. As a result, Omni Cubed Inc is already as respected in the UK stone industry as it is in America for manufacturing high quality, easy to use, durable equipment.

LPE stands for Laser Products Europe, which is the European distribution route for the American Laser Products’ laser templaters, for which LPE has already had considerable success developing a distribution network in Europe. It is anticipating a similar success for Omni Cubed.

The Omni Cubed  products are specifically designed to make the fabrication, transportation, and installation of countertops easier and, most importantly, safer for the personnel involved.

Smart design and innovative features help them stand out. From the lightweight Pro-Dolly HD1 to the versatile Pro-Cart AT2 (the bigger brother to the Pro-Cart AT1), quick and easy Mega-Jaw Carry Clamps and the Aqua-Jaw Carry Vise, there is something in the range for all fabricators / installers.

LPE Tooling will be working with its existing strategic partners in 17 countries to promote the ranges of Laser Products and Omni Cubed to the European market. 

Simon Bradbury says: “Adding another industry-leading brand to our portfolio helps us give our customers the tools they need to do the job swiftly and safely. 

“Omni Cubed Inc is an extremely focused company, run by two families, based in Shingle Springs, California. 

“We have spent some time with them at their new state-of-the-art facility to become familiar with the design, production, distribution, and support they offer.

“Like the other American companies we work with, they use only the highest quality materials, paired with rigorous quality standards and outstanding customer service. 

“All this aside, they are extremely personable and we are looking forward to working with them much more closely. 

“Theirs is a brand truly well known throughout the USA and some of Europe, and we aim to promote and build on this.”

Omni Cubed personnel will also be accompanying Laser Products Europe on a much larger stand than it has previously had at the Marmomacc stone exhibition in Verona at the end of September this year. 

“We are very excited about this new partnership and about increasing the accessibility of Omni Cubed tools throughout Europe,” says Simon.

Not content with increasing the amount of products to its name, LPE Group is also in the process of forming LPE Group Ireland in a joint venture with Pat Swayne Supplies (stoneequip.ie) to promote and sell LPE’s complete range across Ireland.

This means that Laser Products’ templaters, Breton machinery, Comandulli edge polishers, and Turrini Claudio water treatment plant and dust suppression products, as well as the LPE Tooling range (including Omni Cubed products) are now being promoted by one of the best-known names in the stone industry in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

Carl Sharkey says: “We are really pleased to be working with Pat. The market in Ireland continues to grow and we feel he can give the LPE Group and the brands we represent the best push in an area we have been too busy to give our full attention.

“Pat has a great deal of experience in the industry, having great relationships with fabricators and the same focus as us on customer service, quality and value for money.” Service and parts for all the brands will be maintained by the respective UK Companies (Laser Products Europe, Breton UK, Comandulli UK and LPE Tooling).

Waters Group headlines its materials handling products with Aardwolf, which have all the quality of manufacture that has come to be expected from the Germans. If you want to see the extent of the range, visit www.aardwolf.com.de (you can choose which language to view the site in).

But Waters Group also sells Konig products, which now includes the recently introduced full range of European-manufactured slab storage frames, and lifting and handling carts and racks, all galvanized to combat rusting. They are sturdy with some thought gone in to how they will be used to make life a little easier for stone companies, which has tipped plenty of Waters Group customers over to choosing them.

If you prefer wooden shelves to metal – and plenty of people do – Waters sell Delta Rack. The laminated shelves are made up of 13 layers of treated wood that is at home outside as it is inside. They are made in Brussels and once companies have tried them they tend to stick with them. The wood can be gentler than steel to finished masonry stacked on it. It also does not weigh as much (if that is an issue) and don’t worry that the shelves will not take the weight of the stone – they are tested to 1,000kg. And just introduced is the Economy range for those on a tight budget.

Waters also supplies 2m and 3m workshop carts that it has made especially for it by a local company. These are not new. Waters has been selling for them for seven years, with demand for them remaining consistant. They are supplied as components that customers have to assemble themselves. And what you don’t want are trollies moving around as you try to load or unload them, so, as you might expect, the wheels lock.

 One of Waters’ best sellers before the economic crash of 2008/9 were sink hole savers, or anti-breakage bars as they are known these days. When the bottom fell out of the worktop market, sales dropped but they are picking up again now as the market recovers. Waters has stocks of 1.2m, 1.8m and 2.4m sets. The 1.8m lengths are most popular, which Waters promotes at £499 a pair.

A lot of companies like vacuum lifts and Waters sells the Italian-made Righetti range, the most popular of which is the three-pad version with a lifting capacity of 625kg. It has all the usual safety features so it will not try to lift something that will cause a problem. The vacuum can be switched on and off to each individual pad, or a pad removed all together. At £1,699 from Waters it is a bargain.

If you want to use the vacuum lift in conjunction with a jib crane, Waters sell these too. As Nicola Waters, the Group’s Managing Director, says: ”We basically do everything.” And while she is enthusiastic to announce the price of products bought on an individual basis because she believes they are attractive to any customer, she encourages anyone wanting more than one product, or who wants to buy handling equipment in conjunction with the machinery sold by the Group, to talk to the company. “Always get in touch for a quote,” she says.

Another major materials handling product supplier is Stonegate, which is now sole UK distributor for the Hercules range of lifting and handling products. As the name suggests, these products are tough, strong and protect people from danger. With a wide range of lifting and handling products to make the job safer, the Hercules range will ensure both your worktops and your staff are protected and safe.

Stonegate is also now distributing  the high quality, innovative products for the stone fabrication industry from California-based engineering and design company Omni Cubed.

Combined Masonry Supplies and Stone Equipment International have joined forces supply another of the best known brands in materials handling products in the stone industry – Weha.

A combination of German engineering and quality control and Polish manufacture results in good quality products at reasonable prices. What more can you ask?

Stone Equipment International  was at one time the sole representative of Weha in the UK since taking over distribution of the range from Harbro in 2010. Combined Masonry Supplies has not taken on distribution of Weha products but is working with Stone Equipment International, expanding the coverage Weha has in the UK and Ireland. Richard Chandler, the Managing Director of Combined Masonry Supplies, says it has worked out well.

Combined Masonry Supplies has good coverage of the memorial masonry industry and has four vans on the road regularly visiting customers. Before taking on the whole Weha range it was selling a Weha headstone trolley, which proved popular and encouraged it to broaden its offering from Weha.

You can see some of the Weha products stocked in the UK on the two companies’ websites – and the growing sales of materials handling products has encouraged Combined Masonry Supplies to re-think its website (www.masonrysupplies.co.uk).

You can buy products from the site now, but its functionality is limited and Richard Chandler wants to improve it – not least because sales coming via the internet have increased five-fold in the past year.

A significant increase in internet sales is something that those with online shops are reporting across the board. Richard says that although it costs thousands of pounds to develop a good website, the return on investment is significant.

Taking the risk out of transporting stone

Some of the stone industry’s worst accidents, including fatalities, have been as a result of stone being delivered, often when it is being unloaded from lorries.

There are specialist logistics operators that can help reduce the risks associated with transporting stone. One of them is SamSkip.

It has trailer units designed in close co-operation with natural stone suppliers and importers, such as its specialist stone-carrying 12m A-frame flatracks.

Each multimodal unit features two custom-built A-frames to carry slabs of natural stone. These units can also accommodate combinations of slabs, crates and pallets – catering to all needs.

The A-frames, being fixed, integral parts of the unit, are not liable to shifting or slippage during transit.

After unloading, the A-frames fold away into the floor for re-use so those buying the stone have no charges for purchasing frames from the stone supplier, nor disposal costs after use.

The A frames are designed so that stone suppliers need only use straps (less expensive than chains) for securing the stone.

The new units are CSC (Container Safety Convention) plated, meaning they can move throughout the Samskip network by road, train, barge and short-sea vessel.

Local Samskip offices oversee collection and deliveries and have excellent regional knowledge of transport regulations and requirements.

Go with the (traffic) flow

It is all very well taking some of the hard work out of moving stone around a factory, but when there are heavy pieces of stone hanging from cranes and being carried by fork lifts it is a good idea to keep people out of areas where they can get hurt. According to HSE, about a third of workplace accidents involve vehicles and nearly a quarter involve being struck by an object.

One way of keeping people out of danger areas is to clearly mark those areas. A company called Slingsby, which sells  products for doing that (as well as a comprehensive range of other products for making workplaces safer) is advising all organisations to evaluate their traffic management systems at least once a year.

Lee Wright, Group Sales & Marketing Director at Slingsby, says: “The law requires premises that vehicles access to be organised in such a way that pedestrians and vehicles can circulate safely together, which means creating designated traffic routes.”

It’s also important to consider how to identify crossing points and what precautions to use to warn both vehicles and pedestrians they are approaching them.

As forklifts are often reversing as well as speeding through factories, it is important to review the procedures regularly and ensure new employees, both those driving the vehicles and those who will encounter them as pedestrians, are aware of the procedures.

Think about whether something simple such as installing new signage or lighting could have an impact on safety, helping to highlight potential hazards and avoid injuries that occur for no other reason than because people cannot see what they are doing.