dc.description.abstract | In the motor vehicle assembly line, employees typically have long
working hours and suffer highly from repeated operation problem. The
operation hazards associated may include cuts, crushing, ergonomics
hazard, and exposure to hazardous noise. Among those hazards, cuts,
crushing, and ergonomics hazard can generally be improved by
engineering control and personal protective devices. However,
employees′ long-term exposure to noise is difficult to resolve and it will
cause hearing loss, psychological influence, masking effect,
communication influence, and poor performance. The purpose of this
research is to reduce employees′ noise exposure level. After investigating
the sources of noise in the motor vehicle assembly line, we found the
hand tools used such as electric and air impact wrenches were the major
sources of noise. Our major target was to apply the new wrenches which
are of low noise level in a lock attachment torque force of quality needs.
In the simulative test, the noise level of new electric wrench fastening a
screw was measured as 91.8 dB(A), which is 11 dB(A) lower than the old
one. After replacing air impact wrenches with new electric wrenches in
the assembly line, the employees′ noise exposure level was significantly
reduced to 82.5 dB(A) which is 4.9 dB(A) lower than before. Although
this research only discussed wrenches replacement, the results obtained
reveal that replacing new electric wrenches could effectively reduce
employees′ noise exposure level and brings economic benefits. It has set a
model for other motor vehicle manufacturers to improve employee’s
noise exposure. | en_US |