Equipment Proximity Warning System

Votes: 3
Views: 5112

What problem does your design idea solve?
Reduce the number of people killed or injured by vehicles in the workplace. Prevent accidents, save lives, reduce injuries, reduce insurance expenses without increasing the vehicle operator workload.

How does your design work?
Pedestrians wear OSHA approved OnGuardTM Safety Vests (Orange or Yellow) embedded with 20m range RFID tags. Vehicular equipment is outfitted with long range RFID Reader and User Interface to both detect tags and issue alerts via the user interface & vehicle mounted peripherals (lights/horns/etc…). The system is energized automatically with the vehicle ignition or safety seat switch. It then instantly improves both operator & pedestrian situational awareness by creating alerts when a potential incident is possible. Alerts promote the operator to look around vehicular equipment for potential “threats” that might be obscured and also promote the pedestrians to be more aware of their proximity to the moving equipment.

How is your idea novel or an improvement on what is currently available in the marketplace?
20 meter range RFID enables detection of pedestrians and issues alerts well in advance. Alerts operators and also pedestrians when detection occurs. Current products are 1) cameras which require operators to take their eyes off the road around them & focus on camera views. 2) Automatic Beepers/Lights that activate whenever a transmission is put in reverse which doesn’t alert the operator to the presence of pedestrians. 3) ultrasonic & vision detection systems which have line of sight restrictions, are costly, and only benefit short range detection with little time to react to prevent an incident. 4) clearly marked traffic routes, barriers, appropriate crossing points and even speed bumps to control the flow of traffic in confined yards are all localized solutions only.

Where would this idea be applied?
Applied anywhere both pedestrian & vehicular traffic are in a controlled area – distribution centers, loading docks, warehouses, ship yards, construction sites, mines, etc.

What is the market potential?
Every workplace vehicle can benefit from incorporating this type of safety system. The Market potential is Multi-Million $

How would your product be manufactured?
The system is easily manufactured with readily available components. It can easily be added to any workplace vehicle as a “bolt-on” or can be integrated into vehicles that are CAN compatible.

How would the production cost compare with products already in the marketplace?
The cost of the OnGuardTM System is comparable with all other workplace vehicle safety systems

What are the potential benefits?
•Prevent Workplace Safety Incidents
•Improve Situational Awareness
•No Additional Operator Workload Easy to Deploy
•Overhead View Proximity Map
•Safety Vests for Added Work Area Protection
•Uses Vehicle Power Source
•“Bolt-On” solution to Existing Equipment
•Can be Integrated into New Equipment
•Easy-to-use with Minimal Training
•Touch Screen Interface for Intuitive Operation
•High Brightness Display for Outdoor Readability
•Easily Configurable with Security Access
•Detects & Displays Relative Direction
•Stores All RFID Tag Meta Data for easy Data Retrieval & Analysis

Voting

Voting is closed!

  • ABOUT THE ENTRANT

  • Name:
    Dave Michaelson
  • Type of entry:
    team
    Team members:
    Dave Michaelson
    Mike Harrison
    Tyler Bryant
  • Software used for this entry:
    SolidWorks, Unity IDE,
  • Patent status:
    pending