The design of manual handling tasks: revised tables of maximum acceptable weights and forces

Four new manual handling experiments are reviewed. The experiment used male and female subjects to study lifting, lowering, pushing, pulling, and carrying tasks. Each experiment used a psychophysical methodology with measurements of oxygen consumption, heart rate, and anthropometric characteristics. Independent variables included task frequency, distance, height and duration; object size and handles; extended horizontal reach; and combination tasks. The results of the four experiments were integrated with the results of seven similar experiments published previously by this laboratory. The integrated data were used to revise maximum acceptable weights and forces originally published in 1978. The revised tables are presented and compared with the original tables.