Pushing

Pushing is one of the most common manual work tasks and can be investigated very easily with the AnyBody Modeling System™. In this particular example a hospital employee is pushing a bed with a total mass of 200 kg forward at an acceleration of 0.3 m/s^2. The duration of the push is 1.5 second. It is possible to choose three different heights of the horizontal handle bar: 0.9m, 1.1m and 1.3m. The question is: which handle bar height results in the minimal load on the body?

A musculoskeletal model enables simple investigations of muscle efforts and joint forces depending on postures and other workplace parameters. The two figures below chart the overall muscle effort as well as the elbow joint forces through the push. It is evident that the high handle bar is preferable on both accounts, especially when the bed is close to the body.

Click here to see a video of the simulation (2.2 MB).