Abstract:
Manual material handling happens in many production plants. Performing this activity in a wrong lifting method may cause several injuries to the operators such as back pain or injury risk on several body parts. Several complaints related to back pain have been raised by the operators in tire shopping line of PT .X. These complaints scored highest priority, so it has to be improved as soon as possible. This research is done to analyze the manual material handling activity in PT. X based on the compression force on L5/S 1 disc experienced by tire shopping operators during their working activity. By the safe limit of 3,400N, an initial calculation shows that the actual compression forces, which are 5,630.57N (front row) and 6,025.56N+5,630.57N (back row), have exceeded the limit. Two improvements of QFD and lifting method are then developed. Improvement in QFD analysis result in a new rack design which eliminates a compression force occurred in taking the back row tires and improvement in lifting method reduce compression force experienced in taking the tires. The improvements reduce the compression force into 3,228.43N for both front and back rows. The compression forces are reduced for 42.66% on front row and 72.30% on back row.
