[ortusdux]

A few years back I toured a machine shop staffed primarily by blind individuals. The Javits–Wagner–O'Day Act requires federal agencies purchase some select goods made by the blind when possible. Roughly three hundred employees, 90%+ somewhere between legally blind and fully blind, and 1/3rd or so also deaf.

Someone more skilled than I could and should fill a book with the accessibility changes they have made over 50 years of operation. Every single inch of the place had fascinating design details. All machines were laser fenced. Vacuum work holding with audio alignment sensors. All paths had a raised curb. All readouts on CNCs were capable of displaying text one 15" tall letter at a time, or reading G-code aloud or via braille. All offices have one bright wall and one dark wall to provide high contrast for sign language interpreters.

One of the sighted employees I met works in the accessibility dept. redesigning systems to be compatible with various disabilities. He had a full lab of 3d printers, CNCS, and enough other equipment to make a makerspace jealous.

The company also did some amazing outreach through their charity. The provided dogs, housing, and general mobility training (how to navigate busses, etc.).

I should check in and see how they are coping with covid.

[laurent92]

You see, it’s quite useful to talk about it, I was looking for a charity/NGO/open-source software to sponsor and, for a specific reason, Postgres or Debian (which we use) don’t comply to our requirements. You are giving me a new group of charities/social companies to search into.

[zachrose]

What was this company? That sounds amazing.

[ortusdux]

The Lighthouse for the Blind. I donate to their charity annually.

Here is a link to a virtual tour of the facility I visited: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzfCNQatw00

[calvinmorrison]

This is absolutely the coolest thing I have seen so far this year. They have more videos where individual works explain how the work from a call center operator to a machinist journeyman!

[tsss]

Is laser fencing not mandatory in the US?

[profsnuggles]

Laser fencing is the worst, pressure mats are approximately 1000x better. Our machine with the laser fence is always stopping for no reason because there was some dust. I just cut 50 sheets of MDF yea there is going to be some dust.

In woodworking the new trend is to put pads on the gantry with pressure sensors so if the machine smacks you it stops.

That is really great when you are testing new programs you can see what is happening without binoculars. The only downside is that they limit the max rapid speed on the machines so when it hits someone they are much less likely to get knocked over.

[bluGill]

How do those systems stop hair or clothing from getting sucked into the spinning bits? Those two modes have always been the more dangerous ones for spinning tools.

[profsnuggles]

The gantry is enclosed, it's not possible to get close to the router unless you are doing something really... really wrong.

This is the machine I was running like 20 minutes before posting that comment. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7AuwwPdBSf8

I have no idea why the people in that video cut a hole in their door. Seems like a really stupid idea to me. But you can see in a normal machine that someone hasn't modified to be more dangerous you can't get to the the spiny sharp bits.

[DarkStar851]

Looks like that video was a demonstration from a company that sells these machines. The hole was just cut out for doing videos like this I'd assume, not a modification for regular use.

[profsnuggles]

Yea but in the US at least if OSHA, or way more likely our insurance when they doing their yearly inspection saw that they would freak out. That company looks like they are German, and from what I've heard Germany is way more strict about safety than the US.

So in order to sell that machine to me I would require a safety compliant door. My guess is a new door would be around $2800. That is an expensive hole.

What I know that you don't is that that machine is sold with a camera as an additional option. So there is already a place inside for mounting a camera. They would just need to make their own mount. Otherwise if I was just filming a demo to sell the machine I would override the door closed safety interlocks and film with the door open temporarily.

[aj7]

No not in ordinary machine shops.

[oauea]

Wow, that sounds incredibly inefficient and unsafe.

[benlivengood]

Humans are inefficient and unsafe machines, to be sure. Soft and fragile, slow to respond, 98% blind to the EM spectrum, insanely low communication bandwidth, unusually difficult to motivate, prone to acts of defiance, uncalibrated and wandering accelerometers and rotation sensors, very low precision parts, require a host of special atmospheric and environmental conditions to be met, etc.

We're replacing them as fast as we can, honest.

[burnte]

The problem with replacements is the installed base is HUGE.

[earleybird]

And they self-replicate - but we're working on that too.

[neolog]

Nice one.

[bluGill]

I didn't catch anything unsafe. They have laser trip wires anywhere things might be dangerous. This is becomming common industry practice anyway because even people who can see can miss seeing something - a common problem when doing repetitive tasks is to make it faster and faster without realizing that you are getting closer and closer to something unsafe until you loose your arm.

It isn't clear how inefficient they really are. Sure it takes longer to explain to a blind person who to clean the chips off, but in the end it is just a broom (vacuum?) and the only need to do ensure they get everything. Once you train them they have it. Likewise it takes a little longer to explain where the hold downs are then to explain it, but not that much and there are good reasons for hold down placement so once the blind person learns the location there isn't much more training.

I assume they have a few sighted people around for the unique setups that are not enough like something else that it be put into brial. (deaf but not blind can be good at this)

Again back to my first point: everything they pioneer and make work is something that other industry will be interested in as well. Maybe someone with sight can do it easily today, but often once they perfect a method it is better than what the sighted person can do.

Overall I'd prefer to not be doing manual labor myself, but if you can't handle enough school to get a good degree... I'm glad places like this exist for those who need it.

[ortusdux]

Exactly. They are actually efficient enough to be quite competitive in the private sector. They have large contracts with Boeing, and they manufacture a wide variety of things like white boards, backpacks, shovels, canteens, etc.

[andrepd]

Many things are "inefficient", such as building stairs and a ramp where just stairs would be cheaper. Then again there's more to life than that.

[ska]

> Wow, that sounds incredibly inefficient and unsafe.

Only if imagine an unrealistic system where these people were asked to adapt to an existing shop floor, rather than the other way around.

[klyrs]

That's weird, it sounds incredibly safe to me. I've never been in a machine shop that would be safe enough for blind people to work. OTOH, my mom was responsible for keeping factories safe for the workers who hadn't lost their hearing yet...

[imtringued]

Is it less efficient than no employment at all?

[bordercases]

On what metrics?