Pinchpunkter

Pinchpunkter is a Swedish term used to describe points in a system where a process, space, or mechanism can become constricted or hazardous. The term is commonly used across safety engineering, production management, and crowd or facility planning. It is generally derived from the English phrase pinch point, referring to places where parts of the body or materials can be caught, crushed, or jammed, or where throughput is limited.

In safety engineering, pinchpunkter are hazards where moving parts could catch fingers, hands, or clothing. Standards require identification of pinch points, guarding of dangerous areas, safe operating procedures, and lockout procedures to prevent accidental startup.

In production and logistics, pinchpunkter denote bottlenecks that constrain overall throughput. They are identified by analyzing cycle times, queue lengths, and utilization of equipment. Addressing pinchpunkter may involve process rebalancing, adding capacity, changing layout, or implementing automation and buffer stocks.

In facility and crowd management, pinchpunkter occur at narrow passages, doorways, or chokepoints where people can be slowed or packed together. Planning seeks to reduce risk by widening passages, controlling access, or using routing, signage, and staffing.

Pinchpunkter as a concept emphasizes both safety and efficiency: recognizing where a system stalls or becomes dangerous is the first step toward mitigation by engineering controls, administrative measures, or redesign. See also bottleneck, safety gate, crowd flow analysis.