determination of the optimum heat stress index at a foundry

this paper presents a case study to determine the efficiency of the currently used heat stress indices in correlation with wet bulb globe temperature (wbgt) as a permissible index at a foundry plant and to evaluate the extent of the physiological responses such as heart rate and body temperature in correlation with heat stress indices. the field consisted of a foundry plant where a shift work was in operation. the results indicated that wet globe temperature (wgt), corrected effective temperature (cet), and predicted four-hour sweat rate (p4sr) indices have the best correlation with wbgt index respectively, and p4sr and cet indices correlate well with physiological responses more successfully than wbgt does in hot-dry conditions, cet index gives the best correlation with body temperature while p4sr is the most accurate with the heart rate.