Evaluation of a curved handle and handle positions for manual materials handling

Previous studies of handles for two-handed box handling have shown that the best angle for a handle on a box varies with height above the floor. In order to minimize the accommodation between handle and wrist required at different heights, a curved handle was proposed. Six manual materials handling workers lifted 9 kg and 13 kg boxes between conveyors at floor and waist heights for three minutes while body angles were analysed from video tape recordings. Two symmetric and two asymmetric handle positions were tested. Both straight and curved handles resulted in excellent hand/handle fit but were not significantly different from each other on any measures.