The Directive

In July 2005 the Physical Agents Directive 2002/44/EC became European Law for Employers.Until then, there were no UK Health and Safety Regulations specifically dealing with the risks of vibration from using hand held vibrating machinery. The Physical Agents HAV Directive therefore introduced ‘Control Of Vibration At Work’ regulations in order to place duties on employers to protect workers from vibration and reduce exposure levels.This requires employers to carry out various duties including

• Reduce exposure to a minimum
• Provide information and training
• Assess exposure levels
• Carry out measurements and reduce exposure, as well as provide health surveillance when the 'Exposure Action Value' has been reached
• Keep exposure below 'Exposure Action Value' limit

This new directive also incorporates a new standard of powertool vibration measurement BS EN ISO 5349-1:2001 (prEN60745-1:2005),which measures vibration in The Directive brings the manufacturers vibration measurement procedures in line with the Physical Agents HAV Directive. The standard aims to more accurately measure vibration experienced by a user than previous methods have achieved. Therefore, vibration is measured in three directions (otherwise known as the tri-axial or vector sum measurement).