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JOKAB SAFETY AB (Sweden) was founded in 1988 to fill a recognized need for a company to specialize in industrial machine safety. The goal was to simplify the development and integration of electronic safety devices to create safer workplace environments to protect people operating industrial manufacturing machinery. The founders of JOKAB SAFETY AB began their careers in the 1970s when there was significant focus on the safety of manually operated presses. These presses were known to be the most dangerous machinery at the time, with a high probability of operators losing fingers or hands during operation. New safety solutions for both electronic safety devices as well as control systems were being developed and introduced for use on existing and newly designed presses. The future JOKAB founders were directly involved in this work through the design of two-handed devices, control systems for presses and conducting safety inspections for the Health and Safety Authorities and writing regulations for the safe operation of these presses. This work provided an excellent base of knowledge in machine safety. The number of accidents decreased significantly during those years, however these gentle- men recognized that this was just the beginning and there was still tremendous need for more new ideas to enable machine safety equipment to become more practical and ergonomically designed. In the early 1980s, as the use of industrial robots became more commonplace in the manufacturing industry, the future Jokab founders saw that even though workers were outside of the dangerous areas during production, there were times that operators would be exposed to extreme danger. They realized that when an operator needed to inspect production cycle, adjust product positioning, conduct trouble- shooting or programming, the worker would have to go into the area around the robot. During operation it was hard to distinguish whether the robot had stopped safely or was waiting for the next signal, such as a sensor giving a start signal while the operator adjusts a part. Mistakes in safety system design such as the omission of safety devices to stop the robot, unreliable connection of safety devices and unreliable safety inputs on the robot resulted in serious accidents. It became obvious that with new technology also came new safety risks. It was this understanding and a strong desire to find solutions to these and other machine safety problems that helped to create the concept for a company that would specialize in the design and manufacturing of control reliable electronic safety devices. In the mid 1980s as the Standards Committee for Safety in Industrial Robot Systems was writing the first international standard EN 775/ISO 775, the future JOKAB founders were planning the structure and goals of the new company that would become JOKAB SAFETY AB. By 1988 the concept had become a reality and the innovations in machine safety had begun with the introduction of their first universal relay that was designed to use with all types of safety devices. For nearly two decades JOKAB SAFETY has continued to redefine and reinvent machine safety devices to meet international standards and integrate easily into production while protecting machine operators. Today our new safety relays are more flexible then ever and have been engineered to be only 15% of the size of our original relays. Our most current innovations include the Vital, a control unit designed for dynamic signal monitoring to increase and simplify machine safety. Eden non-contact/non-magnetic sensors for interlocking doors operate on dynamic signals with their function continually being checked. Using this technique only one channel is needed to achieve the highest safety level and up to 30 interlocking gates can be supervised and connected in series to one safety controller. Other new developments include our Pluto Safety PLC, which has a unique I/O interface with inputs/outputs that can configured either for static or dynamic signals, allowing for many new safety system possibilities. Monitoring of Time, Frequency, Speed, Sequence and activated safety devices is also easy. It is also much easier to combine several different machines and systems using our unique "All Supervisor" concept with safe bus communication. In an effort to fulfill Jokabs' ambition to simplify the creation of safe working environments we have also developed our unique Safeball for one and two-hand control devices, Focus Safety Light Curtains & Beams, SafeGuard fencing systems and design programs such as SafeCAD. Today you can find our products on machines and systems throughout the world. Together with partners we are building an international network of distribution and technical service. It is our constant goal to achieve long-term relationships with our customers worldwide and provide them with individual safety solutions and services |
