Remove products or workpieces from production equipment
Little of this can be handed to software today.
This happens in the physical world, so software agents do not touch it. Automation here means robotics and machinery, which is a different market from the one mapped on this site, on a much slower clock.
| How automatable | Barely automatable |
|---|---|
| Kind of work | Physical, manual and inspection work |
| Jobs that do it | 30 occupations |
| Tool categories that apply | None |
| O*NET activity | Handling and Moving Objects (4.A.3.a.2) |
What this looks like on the job
Not our paraphrase. These are real task statements recorded against this activity, spread across the 30 occupations that perform it.
- Stop machines to remove completed components, using hand tools.
- Fill or remove product from trays, carts, hoppers, or equipment, using scoops, peels, or shovels, or by hand.
- Remove cooked material or products from equipment.
- Remove workpieces from machines, and check to ensure that they conform to specifications, using measuring instruments such as microscopes, gauges, calipers, and micrometers.
- Unload finished products from conveyor belts, pack them in containers, and place containers in warehouses.
- Remove completed workpieces or parts from machinery, using hand tools.
- Remove parts from furnaces after specified times, and air dry or cool parts in water, oil brine, or other baths.
- Remove objects from solutions at periodic intervals and observe objects to verify conformance to specifications.
- Remove finished workpieces from machines and place them in boxes or on racks, setting aside pieces that are defective.
- Remove items from washers or dry-cleaning machines, or direct other workers to do so.
- Remove finished pieces from pressing machines and hang or stack them for cooling, or forward them for additional processing.
- Remove holding devices and finished items from machines.
- Remove and examine shoes, shoe parts, and designs to verify conformance to specifications such as proper embedding of stitches in channels.
- Remove dyed articles from tanks and machines for drying and further processing.
- Remove spindles from machines and bobbins from spindles.
- Unclamp and remove finished workpieces from tables.
- Unclamp workpieces and remove them from machines.
- Remove completed workpieces from equipment or work tables, using hand tools, and place workpieces in containers.
What we would actually use
Nothing in our landscape addresses this work. That is the honest answer rather than a padded list: this activity needs a person present, or a machine rather than a software agent.
Nothing on this site applies. Automation here is robotics and machinery, a different market on a much slower clock, and no software subscription moves it.
Chosen for the cheapest thing that does the job, not the best funded. Nothing on this site is sponsored, and the full landscape is there when you want to disagree with us.
How people actually do it
No workflow names this activity yet, but these automate the same kind of work, with the prompts to paste and what to keep for yourself.
Who does this work
30 occupations in the O*NET database perform this activity. Each one has a full breakdown of its other tasks.
- Adhesive Bonding Machine Operators and Tenders
- Cleaning, Washing, and Metal Pickling Equipment Operators and Tenders
- Coating, Painting, and Spraying Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders
- Coil Winders, Tapers, and Finishers
- Computer Numerically Controlled Tool Operators
- Cutting and Slicing Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders
- Etchers and Engravers
- Extruding, Forming, Pressing, and Compacting Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders
- Food and Tobacco Roasting, Baking, and Drying Machine Operators and Tenders
- Food Cooking Machine Operators and Tenders
- Furnace, Kiln, Oven, Drier, and Kettle Operators and Tenders
- Grinding and Polishing Workers, Hand
- Heat Treating Equipment Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic
- Helpers--Production Workers
- Laundry and Dry-Cleaning Workers
- Milling and Planing Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic
- Molding, Coremaking, and Casting Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic
- Packaging and Filling Machine Operators and Tenders
- Paper Goods Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders
- Plating Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic
- Potters, Manufacturing
- Pressers, Textile, Garment, and Related Materials
- Sawing Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Wood
- Sewing Machine Operators
- Shoe Machine Operators and Tenders
- Textile Bleaching and Dyeing Machine Operators and Tenders
- Textile Winding, Twisting, and Drawing Out Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders
- Tool Grinders, Filers, and Sharpeners
- Welding, Soldering, and Brazing Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders
- Woodworking Machine Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Except Sawing
Work that goes with it
O*NET groups these under “Remove workpieces from production equipment”. In practice they tend to be done by the same person, in the same sitting.
| Activity | Jobs |
|---|---|
| Apply parting agents or other solutions to molds | 8 |
| Remove workpieces from molds | 6 |
Method. The activity, its taxonomy placement and the occupations that perform it come straight from the public-domain O*NET 30.3 database. The automatability band is ours: we map each of O*NET’s 41 generalized work activities to how much of its output current software can produce, assuming a person still reviews and owns the result. It is a coarse three-way judgment on purpose. A precise-looking percentage here would be invented.