SAFM 502

HOME WORK 8

JAMES OLUSEGUN OGUNYEMI

800186820

PRODUCTS DESIGN FOR ADJUSTABILITY, LOW AND HIGH PERCENTILE

Products are designed to serve different purposes. Designers ensure different
products can be used by different categories of people varying height, weight,
etcetera through:

Design for Adjustability

Design for Low Percentile
Design for High Percentile

Design for Adjustability

Due to the varying body sizes of different individuals in terms of weight, height and
general body structures, some products are designed to ensure that the same
product can work for different people of different sizes just by little adjustments.
One of such products designed with adjustment feature in mind is a Body Harness.
A body harness is a safety product used to secure people working at height in
order to prevent free fall. This is achieved by tying off the line yard attached to the
body harness to an anchorage point on a building.

Figure 1.0: Body harness

As shown in figure 1.0, the body harness is designed with buckles which can be
adjusted to adapt to different body sizes with varying shoulder, chest or thigh. This
in turn will ensure that irrespective of the body structure of different individual, they
feel comfortable, secured and safe when they use the body harness. In fact, this
comfortability will even promote and encourage the use of the product.
(GF Protection, 2016).
Design for Low Percentile
When designing some products which are for general use, considerations are made
specifically for people with the shortest height. Thus, even though this product can
be used by average height people or tallest persons, the product focuses on
ensuring that people who are relatively short can still comfortably use the product.
One of such design is the door handle.
The design of a door handle with which people gain entrance into a building is
deisgned in such a way that the shortest person including children and even
disabled people on wheel chair can access it.
By specification, from the ground level, distance of the door should range between
900mm (2.95ft) and 1100mm (3.60ft).
(UN enable, 2016)
As shown in figure 1.1, even a young who is about 3 or 4 years old as well as a
disabled man could comfortably open the door with its handle. This ensures that
without relatively no assistance, every individual can gain entrance into a building.
Design for High Percentile
Some designs are made to accommodate for people who either taller or fatter than
the average persons. For example, in a building where there is need for ventilation,
fans are installed if an air conditioner is not available. There are two options open
for anyone intending to use a fan; standing or ceiling fan. The ceiling fan installation
is to accommodate for high percentile.
Ceiling Fan must be installed at least 2300mm (7ft, 6.6) tall. This will
accommodate tall people.
In fact, the tallest man on earth is 8ft, 2.8 tall while the tallest woman on earth is
7ft, 8 tall. It therefore presupposes that just a little modifications will be required to
accommodate them.
(SF Gate HomeGuide, 2016)

Figure 1.1: Door height requirement

Tallest man (Sultan Kosen): 2509mm (8ft

2.8)
Figure 1.2: Describing the specification for ceiling fan height.
Bibliography
GF Protection. (2016). Full-Body Harness. Retrieved from Guardian Fall Protection
website: http://www.guardianfall.com/performance-safety-products/full-body-
harnesses
SF Gate HomeGuide. (2016). How Low Should You Hang a Ceiling Fan? Retrieved
from A SF Gate website: http://homeguides.sfgate.com/low-should-hang-
ceiling-fan-68754.html
UN enable. (2016). United Nations website. Retrieved from Architectural Design
Considerations for Doors: http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/enable/designm/AD2-
08.htm