Hi AMMRL Community.
I’d like your insights into operating spectrometers with autosamplers set at seated/wheelchair-accessible height. Bruker’s SampleCase autosamplers can be installed at a height so the spinners are about 28” off the ground, which is apparently considered compliant with the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA). I’d like to hear about experiences with these and other low-height autosamplers, especially if they’re set in an open-access environment where users are accustomed to loading samples while standing or climbing stairs.
I’m in the middle of an upgrade in which we’re installing SampleCase and SampleCasePlus autosamplers on all systems that do not have them already. Part of our motivation is to make every instrument accessible to chemists who cannot climb stairs, and I thought the SampleCases would be a good way to achieve this goal. However, some of the platforms still seem a little high for comfortable use by someone seated. All our systems now have magnets with sufficient shielding that wheelchairs should not pose a significant hazard in the labs, and I’d like to make sure the instruments are accessible.
Once I learned the SampleCases have an “ADA-compliant height” configuration, my helpful Bruker installation engineers helped explore the potential by temporarily securing a SampleCasePlus at the lower height. Until then I had been thinking “Why isn’t this the default height to ensure maximum accessibility?”, but once I saw it I got worried that it would be too low for comfortable loading by standing users. But I don’t know – maybe they’d adapt. Turns out there are technical and practical details on that particular system that are making it difficult to use the lower height (pre-existing Prodigy probe’s transfer line can’t get around the SampleCasePlus on this magnet without rotating the probe and shims), but we’ll try the lower height on another system and see what people think.
If the lower height is something my standing users can work with comfortably, I may reconfigure the instruments so they’re all ADA-compliant. The SampleCases can be re-installed at lower height with a day’s labor and may not even need extra parts (if you have enough spare transfer tube and raceway). But first I’d like to get insights from the community about whether this would be too disruptive to standing users or pose other challenges.
Thanks. – Josh
Josh Kurutz, PhD
NMR Facility Manager, Chemistry Dept.
https://voices.uchicago.edu/chemnmr/
jkurutz_at_uchicago.edu
Received on Wed Mar 08 2023 - 04:26:57 MST