
General Safety Precautions
Materials testing systems are potentially hazardous.
Materials testing involves inherent hazards from high
forces, rapid motions and stored energy. You must be
aware of all moving and operating components which are
potentially hazardous, particularly the actuator in a servo-
hydraulic testing system or the moving crosshead in an
electromechanical testing system.
Whenever you consider that safety is compromised, press
the Emergency Stop button to stop the test and isolate the
testing system from hydraulic or electrical power.
Carefully read all relevant manuals and observe all Warn-
ings and Cautions. The word Warning is used where a haz-
ard may lead to injury or death. The word Caution is used
where a hazard may lead to damage to equipment or to
loss of data.
Ensure that the test set-up and the actual test you will be
using on materials, assemblies or structures constitutes no
hazard to yourself or others. Make full use of all mechani-
cal and electronic limits features. These are supplied for
your safety to enable you to prevent movement of the ac-
tuator piston or the moving crosshead beyond desired re-
gions of operation.
The following pages detail various general warnings that
you must heed at all times while using materials testing
equipment. You will find more specific Warnings and Cau-
tions in the text whenever a potential hazard exists.
Your best safety precautions are to gain a thorough under-
standing of the equipment by reading your instruction
manuals and to always use good judgment.
Preliminary Pages
v