Standards Development

Scope

Type C Standard stating:

Safety requirements industrial mobile robots, traveling on the ground.

For the purpose of this document, an "industrial environment" is a workplace where the public is excluded or restricted from access.

This document, Part 1, is intended to be the first in a series addressing safety requirements. Part 2, to be developed separately, will address safety requirements for the integration of applications of industrial mobile robots.

Exclusions:

The following automated mobile machines are out of scope of this document:

• Industrial trucks defined in ISO 5053-1 (covered by EN ISO 3691-4);

• Industrial mobile robots with actively controlled stability (separately proposed for development as ISO/NP 25785-1);

• Mobile machines whose travel speed and travel direction is solely under control of a driver or an operator (e.g., human remote control, human continuous local control);

• Mobile machines whose travel is solely mechanically guided;

• Mobile machines which are worn by humans (e.g., exoskeletons);

• Road vehicles; • Airborne, waterborne, underwater, or climbing mobile machines;

• Mobile machines used in agricultural and forestry domains;

• Earth-moving and mining machinery;

• Commercial and industrial floor-cleaning robots; and

 • Mobile machines when used in non-industrial environments.

Note: Examples of mobile robots used in non-industrial environments can include: Mobile robots intended for consumer or household use; undersea, military and space robots; or medical, surgical, or rehabilitative mobile robots.

The following hazards are not covered in this document:

• severe conditions (e.g. extreme climates, freezer applications, strong magnetic fields) outside of manufacturer’s specification;

• corrosive or potentially explosive environments (dust, liquid, vapour or gas);

• nuclear environments; 

• specific hygienic requirements;

• ionizing and hazardous non-ionizing radiation;

• during the transportation of (a) person(s);

• when handling loads the nature of which can lead to dangerous situations (e.g., molten metals, acids/bases, radiating materials).

Purpose

Market Need: In the market today, it is becoming common to use industrial mobile robots (IMRs) and complex systems of IMRs in industry. A wide variety of applications creates a need for safety requirements regarding the design and integration of these machines with increasingly complex attachments.

These machines are distinct from “driverless industrial trucks” as defined in ISO 5053-1, the subject of ISO 3691-4. It has limited coverage related to attachments, including the case when such an attachment is an “industrial robot”. ISO 10218-1 and ISO 10218-2 apply when the attachment is an industrial robot. Therefore, a separate standard is proposed to meet this need.

Problem Addressed:

The existing safety standards for industrial robotics (ISO 10218-1,2) do not address the hazards associated with mobility of the industrial robot application. The existing safety standard for driverless industrial trucks (ISO 3691-4) does not address the hazards and requirements of integration of attachments, including industrial robots (manipulators), onto driverless industrial trucks.

There are both gaps and overlaps in the safety requirements stated in the standards available today (noted above), and this creates confusion for users of standards. Such confusion about safety is to be avoided. An ISO type-C Safety Standard is needed to specify safety requirements for industrial mobile robots, and systems of such machines.

Value to standards users: Due to joint efforts of the TC110/SC2 and TC299 Joint Ad Hoc Study Group since 2021, this has been identified as a need and one that will prevent future scope overlaps in the related standards, while providing guidance as to the applicable requirements for such machinery.