Test Your Knowledge Q&A Archives

May 2008 Test Your Knowledge Answers

Test your Knowledge Questions from Pete Holzberg, CSP, ARM, ALCM

Whether you are studying for a certification exam, feeling a little rusty, or just enjoy a challenge, we invite to join in our monthly quiz feature.

Listed below are the answers for our last 6 questions for the Spring. Compare your answers. How well did you do?

Our Test Your Knowledge feature is now on Summer Break. Check back in the Fall for a new set of questions!

1. Which of the following best describes McGregor’s Management Theory “Y”?

2. A punch press machine has an action time of 0.66 seconds. The operator reaction time is 0.75 feet per second. What is the distance an activation switch must be located from the point of operation in order to provide effective “guarding”?

Distance = Machine Action Time X Reaction Time , 0.66 sec X 0.75 ft / sec = about 0.5ft, but there is a safety factor of “5” hence 5 X 0.50 = 2.5 ft.

3. Fly By Nite Computer Company purchases 40% of its components from your company (Inferior Parts, Inc) and 60% of the identical parts were purchased from your competitor, (Sure-Thing, Inc.). In a products liability suit, an independent inspector conducts an investigation and finds out that 10% of your parts were defective and 5% of your competitor’s parts were defective.

If all the parts were combined into one container in the manufacturing process, what is the probability that the part picked at random came did not come from your competitor?

Watch out for “trick” wording. Question reads “Not from your competitor, implies defective part coming from YOUR company.

Calculation: Your company 40 (e.g. out of 100) x 10% = 4 (actual defective) and your competitor 60 (out of 100) x 5% = 3 (actual defective). Total defective (e.g. out of 100 picked) = 3 + 4 = 7 (0.70). But the question asks, probability of part picked is from your company; hence, it would be 4 out (total) of 7 or 0.57 or 57%

April 2008 Test Your Knowledge Answers

Test your Knowledge Questions from Pete Holzberg, CSP, ARM, ALCM

Whether you are studying for a certification exam, feeling a little rusty, or just enjoy a challenge, we invite to join in our monthly quiz feature.

1. What is the primary reason that acetylene cylinders must be stored in an upright position?

2. What is the primary function of the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC)?

3. Months ago, OSHA decide to focus their inspections towards specific types of losses. What are those types of losses?

February 2008 Test Your Knowledge Answers

Compare Your Answers with Our Expert!

Here are the answers to our “Test your Knowledge” Questions for February, provided by the Chesapeake Chapter ASP/CSP Review Chair -- Pete Holzberg, CSP, ARM, ALCM

Compare your answers with our expert. Check back later this month for the next set of questions!

For a review of the November, December, and January questions and answers, click on the box to the right. How well did you do?

1. Your company receives an OSHA citation for inadequate fall protection at one of your job sites. Your next step is:

2. You are annoyed by receiving this citation because you have safety rules and procedures in place, and the citation was the result of employee misconduct. In appealing the citation, the correct process in order of legal precedence is:

3. As an industrial hygienist, you conduct an 8 hour personal breathing zone sample of an employee’s exposure to an airborne concentration of a roof glue compound that contains 3 volatile chemicals: Xylene, Toluene, and MEK. The TWA lab results are: 45ppm Xylene, 50 ppm Toluene, and 80 ppm MEK.

Part A: What is the overall exposure (assuming PEL’s)? Is it within acceptable limits?

Assuming a non-synergistic reaction among the chemicals, overall exposure to a compound is mathematically determined by adding the three “fractions” consisting of TWA over PEL of each chemical (look up the PEL, as it is not given). PEL Xylene = 100ppm, Toluene= 200ppm, MEK= 200ppm. Hence:

45/100 + 50/200 + 80/200 = 1.10 or 110% Overexposure (over 1.0 or 100%)

Part B: If a new glue compound is developed that totally removes the toluene, would the employee’s overall exposure be within acceptable limits?

Removing the Toluene takes away the 50/200 fraction, thus the exposure now is:

45/100 + 80/200 = 0.85 or 85% exposure, within limits. (under 1.0 or 100%).

January 2008 Test Your Knowledge Answers

Compare Your Answers with Our Expert!

Here are the answers to our “Test your Knowledge” Questions for January, provided by the Chesapeake Chapter ASP/CSP Review Chair -- Pete Holzberg, CSP, ARM, ALCM.

Compare your answers with our expert. Pete’s helpful explanation is given below each question. Check back later this month for the next set of questions!

For a review of the November and December questions and answers, click on the box to the right. How well did you do?

1. Many consumer products have warning labels pasted over their packaging and operating instructions. This type of labeling is done for all the following reasons, except:

The manufacturer is ultimately liable for any injuries that may occur from failure of the product and/or from operation of the product if it is proven to be defective. That is why labeling, explicit assembly and proper usage instructions, warnings of inherent dangers, etc., must be clearly printed and diagrammed on products and/or packaging to avoid legal action against the manufacturer. Product liability law also extends critical written warnings in order to protect the end user from "reasonably anticipated and/or obvious misuse" of the product. The manufacturer cannot legally ignore this exposure.

2. What is the tension on each leg of a sling, when lifting a 20,000 lb (evenly distributed weight) I-Beam with an angle of 60 degrees (angle where sling meets the I-Beam)?

First, draw a diagram to show the problem. Second, solve Sine 60o = Opposite
Hypotenuse

“Opposite” of each leg equals ½ of total weight on each sling member hanging directly down the middle to form two back to back imaginary triangles from the two rigging slings Hence each leg or sling line hanging straight down would be equal to 10, 000 lbs.

Sine 60o = 10000 or Hyp = 10000
Hyp Sine 60o

Using a calculator, Hyp = 11,547 and 11547/2 = 5773 on each leg.
As the angle gets smaller (where it meets the load), the tension (stress) gets greater on each leg.

3. The ASME (America Society of Mechanical Engineers) has strict requirements on testing procedures. It requires hydrostatic pressure testing at ____ % of the ____.

This requirement comes directly from the ASME manual. The purpose is to prevent product failure in an anticipated worst-case scenario.

December 2007 Test Your Knowledge Answers

Compare Your Answers with Our Expert!

Here are the answers to our “Test your Knowledge” Questions for December, provided by the Chesapeake Chapter ASP/CSP Review Chair -- Pete Holzberg, CSP, ARM, ALCM

Compare your answers with our expert. Pete’s helpful explanation is given below each question. Try this month’s questions on our home page. Check back later this month for the answers!

For a review of the November questions and answers, look below the December answers. How well did you do?

1. You are a safety director of a large manufacturing company. On January 1, 2008 (end of the fiscal and insurance policy year), your boss will ask you to produce objective data showing whether the safety program has improved the company’s bottom line over the past year. What would be the best data to procure?

Explanation: Lost work days, whether paid by the company (typically the first three days) or by the insurance company (days 4 or more) cost money in terms of loss of earnings or wages/ productivity. Experience Mod is a cost factor, but it represents the previous 3 years of accident experience and NOT the current policy period nor the previous full policy year. The operant word here is “past year” which has not been incorporated into the E-mod yet.

2. Company ABC receives a citation involving an unguarded nip point on a piece of equipment. What are the employee’s rights in dealing with this citation?

Explanation: Since the citation dealing with a hazard could place the employee in harms way of possible future accident or health hazard, Employees would have the right to have their voices heard since they are the ones exposed.

3. An incandescent light is measured at 50 footcandles (FC), 5 feet over a quality control workstation.

Part 1 -- What would the approximate illumination level be at the working surface?

Explanation: Follow the Inverse Square Law, in x do squared = in x do squared. Answer = 1/25 x 50 = 2 AFC

Part 2 -- Does this meet the suggested guidelines for the proper level of illumination?

Explanation: The suggested illumination level for normal intensity at the desk level is 100 FC.

November 2007 Test Your Knowledge Answers

Compare your answers with our expert. Pete’s helpful explanation is given below each question.

1. How long should a company keep records of its products being produced?

Explanation: Potential Products liability cases have no real statute of limitations in terms of being sued, e.g. for injuries sustained from product defects etc. Hence, it would be prudent to keep records (e.g. product development, operating instructions, design drawings, labels, warnings and warrantee records, etc.) from “cradle to grave” of the foreseeable life of the product

2. The OSHA General Duty Clause can be cited when all of the following conditions are in place, except:

Explanation: Tricky question -- note the word “except”. Safety and Health professionals, although helpful in cases, are not in “the mix” of this legal resolution.

3. Using a standard sound level meter, a reading of 102 dba is recorded at 20 feet. Under normal (freeform space) conditions, how far away from the noise source must the next reading be taken to achieve a reading of 90 dba?

Explanation: This can be done precisely by noise logarithm equation, but a “quick and dirty” method is using the double the distance, minus 6 rule. Hence, you double the distance (20ft to 40ft) from the noise source, you get 102dbA minus 6 = 96dbA. However, still not down to 90dbA, so you must double the distance again (40 x 2 = 80 ft), which allows you to subtract 6 from the previous number 96dbA (96 minus 6), which equals 90dbA.

Of course, the caveat here is assuming the noise prorogation route is in “free form space”, e.g., no obstacles, barriers in the direction to noise travel (and place of measurement), surrounding metal objects which could reflecting/reverberating the noise, etc.

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