 I'd like to introduce Henry Rich. Henry is the Project Coordinator of Wool Grower Services at AWI. Henry graduated with a Bachelor of Agriculture Economics at Sydney University in 2015 after which he moved home to help out on the family property at Burke in Western New South Wales. He began a career at AWI in 2017 where he is now Project Coordinator of Wool Grower Services. Henry works with six AWI funded grower networks including Sheep Connect here in SA as well as having worked on AWI's Shearing Shed Design Project. Today he will talk about a recent AWI investigation into Shearing Shed Design and how this has led to improvements in the way shearing sheds can be set up in the future. So please welcome Henry. We're on. Thank you Emily. Thank you to the Red Maiden Wool Growth Programme as well for having us all here today and thank you everyone for turning up. It's a great roll up here. See I'm at AWI nearing on four years there and as mentioned I'm from Burke in Western New South Wales where we're predominantly Marinos with a few black cows and some goats as well. So yeah today I will be talking about Shearing Sheds and the likes and there is also a few other AWI staff here as well. We've got John Roberts up the back there in the Woolmark hut as well as Emily King and Andrew Dennis is outside as well so you'll be hearing from Emily as well but all us for about all day. So what I'm going to speak about today is this shed here on the left. What's unique about it, what's inside it and how we got there. Recently last year in November we launched the Safe Sheds Programme so that's there in the middle and then this little guy on the right I'll just introduce it but Emily's going to talk about it in her tech presentation. So firstly with the Shearing Shed Design Project what we did was we wanted to find out what was good in a shed and to start that off we had an industry-wide survey as well as them putting together a working group and evaluating through two existing sheds. We looked to prototype and workshop a design, evaluate and trial it and then out of that build a blueprint that we could provide to industry for what this design looked like and then one of the working group members at Dubbo Hilton Barrett he ended up building this shed off the designs we pulled together and we hosted some open days there and I do know there's a few in South Australia there's two sheds over on the Air Peninsula and Jody's actually building one herself later in the year so that's exciting some of you might know of one over here I'm not sure and Kangaroo Island actually as well. So looking at it when looking at a Shearing Shed it's a whole of shed approach as well as individual design features so in looking at that you have the criteria and assessment so looking at what's efficient for workers and the flow of livestock has to be safer for our workers needs to provide quality wool preparation and then looking at of course the welfare of our livestock so being able to ensure that as well. So with the survey as I mentioned efficiency and flow, safety, quality and welfare all assessed and looking at that in the tour again so going around sheds and going what parts in this shed is good what's bad how do we pull that together in a whole of shed approach and looking at all aspects so for an example I'll talk about door heights what we considered with it and I'll also talk about a whole of shed approach. You might see here this is when we're out on our working group so we did this near Dubbo and across to Wellington in New South Wales not sure how well you can see it but we're starting to draw here on the ground at this shoot that'll make sense when I start showing you some of the diagrams of what we ended up with and down here in the bottom right is a little frame we had made up and used it as a mock shoot so out of the survey and out of the shed tour we identified some key features that we need to look at and how we can address those against that criteria so what we need to focus on was this inefficiency and pen flow so the sizes of pens, backfill pens and things like that we needed to look to remove that and make it as easy as possible out the back of the shed. Dragon shape long distances and around corners for shears we need to eliminate that and improve it where we could. Small and uninviting shoots another pressure point for our shears so looking at that release and making it easier. Long and uneven distances for our wool handlers so across the board the wool table your wool bins and then you press and then of course looking to improve workplace quality safety and satisfaction so that's not only in the workplace but also across facilities and amenities so they're moving on to looking to prototype to answer some of these things you can see here we've knocked up a prototype which is in that left hand image and then on the right some of the drawings that we came up with so I'll just show you a quick video of this prototyping that we went through and what I really want you to focus on here is a couple of those things that I said we need to identify in the long drag and the hard release of shapes so you'll see him release this shape and where its front legs fall and the position he's ended up in as well as where he goes to get that next shape and his drag drag path with that shape you will notice in this first video that he has to go around his hand piece but that's just a function of putting it down to where you're going rather than where you've let your shape go because of the different angles we've created. So where he's finishing up there again those front feet just looking at this here straight down there in the middle of that pen back to where he's shearing station is is that straight drag that we've been able to create and he's come straight back there. This is just in an old shearing shed at Dubbo where the Hilton Barrett built the new shed on so you can see and we've just cut this hole in the floor and we're working everything around it another video here for you from a different angle over in the back right hand corner the back and back nice and straight. So just looking at that to give you an overview of it from above we've got the catching pen here I've highlighted that for you the 5.9m squared we've got the down tube location there and then we've got the shoot going out that way with that arrow then just looking at flow we've got the flow of shape there clockwise around through the front fill into that 5.9 from the fill pen which is the 5.8 the angle of the straight drag there with that arrow and then again the shoot release heading that way that's what it looks like when you repeat that out from your single stand and board out through two six pens so you've got the catching pen fill pen and then that laneway pen extends all the way around that's what the individual stand looks like in this shed at Dubbo so you can see there catching pen through the doors and nice wide shoot there and then that's it from above. So just before I go into talking about the design features of the shed I'll just play this quick video just a little guy that was in that first image of the mock person that's been created from those orange dots on our shearer here so looking at shear emotion and muscle fatigue that I'll leave that for Emily to discuss later on and he's just strike that straight back there so I'm going to run through the shed now and and all the benefits and the key functionality within it but I think it's important to note that yes this is a new shed and what we've we've found to be important for all those criteria have been executed everything in this shed has been done on purpose but that's not to say it's not relatable to any shed existing or new so I think as I'm going through yes some things with the angles aren't there and possible to do in existing sheds but a lot of the other key features can be done and where we can be looking to improve our workplaces we should be considering that I suppose just from around the room who's built shed in the last 10 years so a couple hands that's good and who's looking to build one next couple years just a few more hands awesome so looking at the shed entry we've got the the image there at the top left it's a wide ramp with considerable access we've provided that walkway and rails as well so not only is it more efficient for the person to get up and down it's also safe for them it's a soft grip flooring so that's to say it's not a hard steel or the likes so concrete or whatever it is there is a soft grip shape a walk much better up and down that we've got a wide door so you can see that here and then coming into the yards we've got the bordered fence and paneling which you can see in that bottom image that goes around not only does it absorb noise but it's great for animal welfare and their flow so they're not going to be crushing around into something they can't see through and similarly the walk around corners due to that inquisitive nature so I haven't seen a dog used in any of the sheds built off this design and they just absolutely flow through it I think one guy was actually saying his well in WA his sheaf and his fade light the lambs will that's almost too good they have to slow them down and work in smaller mobs the non-directional plastic grating you'll see on the floor not only does it drain perfectly fine but it's also great at minimizing the amount of light that's coming up into that shed and creating borks for sheep so as we all know with the timber sluts that we have in sheds if the sheep's looking down in they can see through it and if there's light coming in to get that where the plastic grating is also quite deep it's nearly a couple of inches so out of sheep's height you're not seeing down through that plenty of in shed storage and this place has actually got outside storage as well enough shape for the day ahead and then just for flow and efficiency in the backpins these gates are all slide swing so you can open them into it without moving sheep around and then that acts as a wing as well when you bring them around and into the next pen so it's a modular design and what I mean by that is each one of these six stand units is exactly the same so however many stands you would like to go for it is all identical in its way around through that angle we've been able to create the straight drag and minimize differences distances sorry around for the wool handlers with that U shape and then looking at the blueprint design what when we did the blueprint for this it has its own structural integrity and what I mean by that is it can be built in an existing shed so that the drawings that we've had done up for this can be used and in its own structural integrity integrity without relying on the shed around it catching fill and laneway pens so just firstly the catching pen is the only pen in the shed that has timber so you can see that there with the front fill there's a little step in we've just worked some high visibility paint across that minimizing any risks there for shed stuff and it is a little step in there but that doesn't seem to worry the sheep at all and sheep naturally will walk uphill so they walk up into that back corner away from the catching pen door present themselves facing away from the shearer and then with the slope coming back down it then allows for an easier tip and drag and it's downhill along the grating or slats that are parallel to the drag path so they're not dragging across those with a higher level of friction the catching pens free from obstacles so what we've done here has been able to move the shoot to where it is we've taken it out of the catching pen quite often with shoots going back into catching pens it creates a trip hazard and in addition to that by taking it out we've allowed for more room and so by doing that we've actually reduced the depth of the pen as well and just on the pen sizing so overall those three pens for that shear will hold just over 70 sheep and half of that is about your average run for your shearers to say 35 or so the first two pens so your catching pen here and your fill pen will hold that 35 one run and the laneway behind it that same amount again so they're all filling each other and then half with the laneway to will service half of it will service the next pen sorry catching pen doors they are lightweight they're timber looking to reduce noise and impact for our shears they're double swing so that is to say they swing in and they swing out both all the way so it's double hinged there it's high enough to balk those sheep on the front fill but it's low enough to avoid impact with shearers elbows and as you can see in this bottom photo Corey's elbows are well above that door but why that's important is when a shearer starts especially on iron doors when they start hitting their elbows the first reaction then is to take that first impact with their bottom and then that'll just that creates an unnatural stress load again through their backs so we're just looking to reduce that gap between the doors between the two buttons and as well as below it so looking to remove any pinching or wedging of feet of sheep and people rounded corners so no sharp edges and this right hand door is when swung open clear of impact so that's to say it's not going to hit the down tube or the handpiece when swung open and it will also release early enough that when the shearers any station it's shut behind him so looking at the board what's important here so I keep mentioning the straight drag why that's important is to remove any long-term strain through twisting on our shearers knees hips and back so we've allowed for that but one thing that quite often well we didn't it was an unintended outcome but where the down tube is here being moved left or right takes it away from or towards the chute parallel to the drag path of the shearer and so why that's useful is as a shearer they don't all shear the same some will she forward away from their chute some will she back on it so it allows that flexibility for the individual as well as being able to manage fatigue so I've seen people shear a shearing in this shed and say at lunchtime 70 kilo doing these are the likes he the front feet would ended up falling short of the chute because he was getting fatigued as the day was going on and we just pivoted that down tube on that mount not not even an inch towards the chute and those front feet kept falling straight in again so we've got enough room for the shed hands to get around and assist the shearer and access wall and what I mean by that because of the angles we've created in it being less obtuse is we need to make sure that that will handler could get around and do that it provides that functionality we did prototype it with three stands and just to make sure that one will handler could service all three stands properly and make sure that we're doing a good job on the wall we've got a timber board back here so not only does it remove visual cues but it takes vibrations and minimizes noise and we've got a non-slip smooth tongue groove so to say that we need a smooth surface for wall handling and dragging shape but we don't want it to be slippery a lot of new sheds quite often go up now and they'll get a coating of something or other on it and it's going to end up being slippery and some of you might say in shears with their combs and things roughing that up so we don't want to make sure we're providing it smooth but not slippery we've got plenty of room on top here for storage of our shears and each stand's got a power point of its own we don't want to have our cords and things hanging around the shed quite often I get asked about why it was a flat board nut is a personal preference and choice there's no reason why this shed can't be built into a raceboard design only two weeks ago I found out about these two sheds the first one so the top ones are Wagga so New South Wales DPI is built out there and then this bottom one is the one on Kangaroo Island I mentioned with Turkey Lane Marina so they built that after the bushfires last year they got through their shearing down there with their two-stand shearing trailer we took down there and then just recently they were able to have their later shearing in the new shed and I think some of you might recognise the minister there so firstly with this decision for a raceboard flat board just a few things that were raised by the working group of people we had in this project so looking at that what to consider when looking at a raceboard you do not need to retrieve or prepare the fleece on the table and it can be used as a preparation surface so quite often that's the crutch that's being removed you are shearing on a raised surface so quite often those rails like that top inch are going to be used to mitigate that I was speaking to a fellow from Hay the end of last week New South Wales a wool broker and he's looking to build a raceboard with this as well and we're talking about hand rails mitigating our raised board and and we raised being able to hang the rails from above so those vertical rails are out of the way for our wool handlers so I'd like to see how he goes with that and a lot of wool handlers have reservations about working at the same height as moving sheep and a moving handpiece and so that's one other thing that we've heard of you know reservations about being able to confidently go in and properly do a good job on that wool because of that and again a lot of short and tall people not everyone's the same height so different difficulties working on raised boards flat boards so clearly we're not working at a raised height and there's no obstructions for the board it's easy for you to help if that's that sheep's playing up and you need to go and support that shear wool handlers have access right around the fleece so not just on the leading edge of a raised board they can get right around that fleece and work it from any angle similarly with their broom although you do need some nil to retrieve and prepare the fleece so just some things that I consider if you are looking at that so on to the shoot it is a wide shoot facilitating that ease of release so it's 800 mils wide this shoot and that's important not only because it's more inviting but it is designed to end up at a release point on the shoot but if you don't end up exactly square there's still so much access to that shoot it has a vertical drop off at the top of the shoot so just taking that weight right away from the sheep to start off with as well as the recess into the board and then a graduated slope down and out and then an uninterrupted exit quite often here sheds going up where the support structure underneath it has ended up being at the bottom of the shoots and things and putting padding on it so they're not smashing around into them and things but so just something else there that we've seen vibration free surface on top here so for that storage for our shearers we put rubber or timber on top of the shoots just to take the vibrations out on their gear they spend a lot of time sharpening it and looking after it so just providing that for them quite often people will say I'm a bit worried about putting my foot down that big recess shoot how we've mitigated against that is that shoots 800 mils high because 800 mils high would be a balk for some sheep but with the vertical drop straight away that isn't an issue and 800 mils high that's about your bottom height so a shearer will always back into that and never be right on top of that shoot with their feet wool handling and wool room so looking at creating those even short distances we've been able to do that with the flexible considerably configuration so everything in that wool room is portable so being able to cater for different marketing strategies and the likes the floor is load bearing so that press can be wheeled about to anywhere in the shed if he's using one stand two stands he can wheel it right up there and if he's going direct into the press that's easily done there's enough space for a second wool table here so it is quite wide and I know there is a lot of tighter sheds out there one reason for that is not only so people aren't tripping over the top of each other but to be able to get a second table in if we've got six good shearers going so the way you do it is just to place it in a V facing upwards like so to say the second stand and the fifth stand with your cluster down this bottom side bordered wool bins that's to say it's not a mesh or similar we've spent all the time classing and preparing our wool would be a great shame for things to get mixed up in the bins and then consistent and well it will handling in classing areas so natural light's great and that actually is a panel up the back there now that allows for natural light to come in but natural light is never consistent so if it's raining one day and sunny the next or within the same day that's not going to be a great outcome for your class so who's trying to class on color and consistency so making sure we've got a nice white light in that shed over our stands and over our classing tables is going to allow for that consistency general features in the shed spoken about the minimal unwanted light coming up from underneath the shed and balking sheep the shed goes right to the ground so there's no light coming in from underneath it as well we have a separate grinding area so you can see that's down on concrete bay down from the wool room large windows and shutter design so sometimes we want to encourage airflow sometimes we want to lock it out lock out the elements you wouldn't actually put in air conditioning obviously not a reality or appropriate in a lot of places but something to consider we should all be putting up shed safety signage I'll talk about where we can get that from in a second when I get down the back end of this presentation importantly a first aid kit and a fire extinguisher should be in your sheds an emergency stop button so either at each end of the board or at each stand if it's a raised board put them underneath it so you will handlers don't bump into them and then I think this is probably one of the more important things on this this slide here directions coordinates and contact numbers there's a horrible case that some of you might have heard in New South Wales where a girl was scouted by overhead gear we've got her hair coordinate it took them two hours to get onto emergency support and actually tell them where they were because they didn't know they'd got there the night before and there was no one at the shed to be able to tell them so directions coordinates if it's air support that's needed and contact numbers UHS please display all of that in your sheds amenities is my last slide on shed design but also probably one of the more important ones we should all be looking to try and provide most comfortable workplaces we can showers and toilets male and female enclosed kitchen spaces we need clean preparation services and all appropriate kitchen accessories table and chairs I haven't seen many sheds with it but it'd be nice to not eat where you work and hot and cold water and then a large sink and sink and shower head you'll see here we've put this shed of doubles put in a shower head freeze tap so that just allows the shears to go in and she wash their whole arms and throw their head under if they like and then large sinks to do that as well so where can we find all of this wool.com forward slash shed design is where I've got all this and what's on there is the technical drawings so in PDF format I can provide them in a CAD file so I can send that out come and find me later on if you'd like to discuss that we've got an overview that runs through the project and you can see some of the prototyping we were doing in that and then we've got a floor plan of the art design in that shed at Dubbo and then basically everything that I've presented just now is numbered to where it is in the shed and that information is around the border of that publication wool.com forward slash shed design so just to summarize that and back to my point on not everyone's building a new shed and there are some things we can do to old sheds to make them better two quick slides here to run through some of the most important things that I've heard from these guys the working group we had I don't know how many national weld titles were between them they're sheer trainers wool handler trainers amazing bunch of people different skill sets but from them with pen sizes look to limit the amount of light coming in from under the shed and look to put in slight swing gates I don't know if anyone has those telescoping ones you've got to push through the cylinder bloody horrible things we've got them at home put in a slight swing gate they're so good catching pens now that sloped catching pens with the slats running sorry with the slats running parallel to your drag path is important but if you can put in a slope as well so I don't know if you have an existing shed that doesn't have a slope but if it is a front fill as you saw that little step in at the front of that pen isn't going to prohibit the movement of shape they will just step up over it and into it pen doors so thinking of our shearers and the elbows and the impact you know consider lightweight timber and jewel doors and so either 50 50 in width or if that right hand door is going to be a problem hitting your down tube go to the 75 25 percent for your left and right door if it is a back fill pen and you can't get those pen doors down low without creating problems for your pen our upper we can put a third door on top that's just left open when we're shearing and shut when he's penning up so just like a barn door I guess is the best way to describe that and then off the back of the story I just mentioned please consider removing overhead gear and replacing with electric stands they have safety cutouts now much safer but they're also provide much higher performance for our shearers and they can actually gear them and things it's much better performance for them as well looking to the shoot get it wide 600 800 in the project we had we went to 800 put in a recess and put in a vertical drop at the start of it take away the weight from the shapes they're on their way the shoot is an obstacle going back into your catching pen you can just simply board it off with some panelling making sure we've got enough storage and hanging space and for tools and again with that timber or rubber matting amenities male female deep sinks hot water ventilation lighting tables and chairs we need to be providing as much comfort as we can and then I don't know any sheds here your contractor knows them best you know them best I think they'll have a bit to say about some of the things that could be done in there sometimes maybe too much to say but it's good to have that conversation and prioritise where we can so if we if you're not sure where to start I'd have conversation with them they're the guys that use it at the end so I guess I'll smooth onto the safe sheds program but I guess where this and all that shed design fits for us is looking to attract retain and increase the longevity of careers within the wool industry so along with things like this and resources we can provide to you we do a lot of work in shear and wool handler training Emily will talk about some research we're doing on shear injury this safe sheds program we launched in November so just to run through what we're trying to do here is to outline the duty of care and obligations of people in a shed provide a best practice self-assessment guide to go through your shed and assess it and identify those hazards and safety risks and where you can make improvements and throughout it we've got we can create improvement plans and actions to amend those so how it's set out is it's got those legal obligations it runs through how to use the document and manage those risks but then we've got five modules that has been pulled together from across industry across Australia with our partners WA Shearing Industry Association but starting in the shearing shed we look at all the features and some of it's for safety some of us just best practice against that criteria I've explained so we go through the shearing shed machinery and equipment amenities and facilities work practices and then general working conditions and then we provide checklists to go against that so you can either do the full thing go through right through your shed right through your amenities facilities with the full assessment we have a pre-shearing checklist in this we have an induction checklist so when you start working a new location it should be an induction process at the start of that so do you know how to use the press do you know where the safety features of that press are what are the risks with that press for example are some of the things that you would be discussing in that looking to mitigate against any risk or injury that might occur and then there's a post shearing checklist if we've got things that need to be fixed up so where can we find safe sheds program so wool.com forward slash safe dash sheds is where we've got that there's a hard copy version and then all of that's online in a pdf as well but we've partnered with ioditor and put it into an app as well so it can be used on a desktop or on your phone and just on the app it's got some other functionality within it so it does work offline once you've downloaded those checklists and allows you to not only assess things but take photos and nights on it and that's important because not only is a record of any action or things that have done with a date and timestamp but you can also share across multiple accounts so talking to your contractor within the app on specific things or perhaps it's a colleague who you're going to be delegating the work to down the track and they can go onto it and you can all be within that same system against the recording you get formatted reports on the actions and completions and the app also has incident reporting within it so if there is injury or an incident within the workplace it can be recorded there sharing shed safety signage so wool.com forward slash safe sheds you can go on there and order those we've had those built and then just providing them back at cost with postage so they're on there please help yourself for those and yeah look thank you very much for your time and we're here all day so please come and chat if you do want to talk about any of those programs or anything else happening at AWI but thank you very much. Thanks Henry for a lot of information there Henry also has those copies of the so shed booklet out at the AWI stand today so if you would like to pick one up feel free um do we have any questions? Okay just obviously what was that what's the cost of a six-stand shed and a three-stand? I did get a quote for a six-stand the other day so I think they were getting the shed with a skill in over the yards done for maybe 142 and then the fit out with the flat boards 180 raiseboard 200. Have you made any consideration to left-handers? Sure uh I get that question nearly every time um I think maybe I'll leave it out on purpose so we can have a chat uh yeah so it's not in the design features but where you would put the left hand stand is down here on your first stand so this is the catching pen here so just to reverse it in a way so your catching pen door would end up on this corner with your shoot being out here and the sheep going down through the shoot that way um that being said there's not a lot of left hand shears out there I don't know if anyone here has one that she's in their shed yeah no one yeah yeah no exactly well then I guess that's um you know one way around that is to you know when you're talking about how many sheep you're shearing what day you're starting we don't have a left-handed stand um but yeah they are out there and I think um if they're coming in grain to training our trainers would just train them right-handed but if they have started out left and that you can't get them over to that right hand then they will stick to it yeah I'll just rank yeah I've got uh electronic counting systems so no we haven't um yeah I've heard mixed results and uh different things and there is a bit of stuff out there that is like lasers that just click as it goes past um yeah it is out there but if you have your shoot pens or let out pens big enough for a run it's pretty it's it's fine to go down I guess and you're not wasting a labour unit while you're shearing and you can always count and double check that and some sheds won't have pens they'll just go straight out and be boxed but um hearing pretty mixed reports about actuals and tallies but no we didn't have a look at it as part of this project no all right um it does make it I'm just repeating what was said it makes it a lot quicker for that labour unit while they're working if they don't have to be out there counting out sheep can I just get you to repeat that question yeah so what's optimum for the slope in a catching pen that is 280 mil high at the back and I think it's three metres deep so not quite so yeah that's probably the max end and I wouldn't go any more than that um some guys that have built this shed and they've been to this one have built probably maybe just up to 200 mil at the back and um yeah so I think the guys when they look at it the first time when they come into this shed they go geez that's deep don't want to be walking uphill into that and then they'll get halfway through the run or finish the run and go geez I love it um but I think any slope is better than no slope uh but I'd say that's probably the max I wouldn't go more than that yeah 200 seems to be fairly agreeable 200 mil yeah the designs getting refined as more and more teams start to use these sheds yeah it is and I had hoped as part of this project um because quite often we get asked could try doing different things with it but I really hope that now that we've made it fairly available to the industry uh it will be improved and made so much better um there is little tweaks here and there the guy built it in WA he shares always feedlotter and he shares over 60 000 a year and his shed so he raises it up um nearly above maybe eight foot even but he can get his bob cut in there so he cleans it out with that um I think the chute is one thing that's been changed when asking Hilton what he'd do differently in that shed he would have put tongue and groove right through the wool handling like under the table because you might have seen in that one it just went around the board um because he's got ply down through the wool handling up to the press and things so he's found he would have preferred to have put a smooth surface right through the wall room um so little things like that overall probably not probably the slope in catching pens one thing people get variable um and then uh some of the backyard design but each their own that shed came in from the back right a lot of people that are building it now bring them in from the back left so that's then a clockwise from there um but that's about the only changes I've heard of as well as the raised board being put in