Considering Human Variability in the Design of Safe Interaction with Agricultural Machinery: The Case of Foldable Roll-Over Protective Structure (FROPS) Manual Handling

The foldable roll-over protective structure (FROPS) protects the operators against fatal injuries in tractor accidents. However, a rear-mounted FROPS is often folded down or removed. In present study, accessible zones and grasping areas were redesigned adapted to 5th, 50th, 95th European human anthropometric percentiles enhance its correct comfortable use. Then, rod was proposed as design solution make roll-bar fall within new zones. prototype increased reachability facilitated raising handling, especially for shorter users. study results redesigned, taking into account percentiles, will be helpful rethinking issues manual handling of machinery components, support behaviours, human-machine interaction more safer all.