Protective guarding goes the extra mile

Volvo’s new facility in Ridgeville, S.C., will eventually employ more than 4,000 people and a sizable fleet of lift trucks. To get a head start on facility safety, the company installed a full suite of impact-resistant products including traffic barriers, column protection and pedestrian guarding.

The new plant consists of three main buildings: the weld shop, the paint shop and assembly shop. The company wanted premium protection for its employees, infrastructure and assets, with a particular focus on areas with high traffic like the vehicle assembly area where thousands of individual parts go into making each car. These components need to be transported, stored, picked and transferred to the assembly lines. The facility was operational during two main installation phases, which saw almost a mile of safety barriers added through the campus.

The barrier manufacturer conducted a full safety survey, assessing intersections, crossing points, traffic areas and machinery that needed to be protected. Volvo decided to limit the movement of its largest vehicles to specific areas, mainly the logistics receiving areas. Tailored solutions were installed in all required areas, including pedestrian railing, high-level barriers and column guards, gates and bollards. The new equipment (A-Safe) is made from a patented blend of eight materials and rubber additives that absorbs impacts without incurring damage to equipment or the barriers.

“The depth of the product range provided the flexibility to meet our wide variety of applications,” says Robin Ollis, layout planning engineer at Volvo. “The strength of these safety barriers is impressive. They have demonstrated their ability to protect our people, equipment and the facility from the day they were installed. It was a pleasure working with the team from product selection through layout design and installation.”

Volvo plans to expand the facility further and will install additional barriers and safety equipment.