Whether You Keep Your Profits May Depend On Your Automated Palletizing -

Details for Whether You Keep Your Profits May Depend On Your Automated Palletizing

ID:	12687
Author:	johnfranklin
Title:	Whether You Keep Your Profits May Depend On Your Automated Palletizing
Article:	Every work cell of the production line that you use to manufacture products for your customers can contribute positively or negatively to your profits. You need to squeeze as much capability out of every work cell that you can to contribute positively to profits. This includes packing and palletizing of products as they come off the end of the production line. You can use an automated palletizing device to properly pack your goods for shipping and distribution. The demands for environmentally friendly packaging has made the design of automated palletizing equipment more complicated than ever. There has been a switch away from cardboard boxes and toward thin-walled press board, shrink-wrapped bundles of products, and other eco-friendly packaging. Automated palletizing devices must be able to handle the wide variety of packaging that is now being required. There is now a need for packaging on pallets that is used by club stores for display of it products to its customers. This type of display requires that packaging of products be in multiples, a method of packaging that is a recent addition to production. Knowing the demand that customers have for the packaging of your products will help you to decide what types of tools you will need for automated palletizing equipment. If there is a wide variety in types of packaging that needs to delivered, then you will need to review a wide variety of tooling that can be used to handle all the scenarios of packaging. The end-of-tool that you attach to your robotic that is used for loading and unloading pallets can come in a variety of configurations with multiple abilities. The different type of tooling are vacuum, side clamp, fork style and layer handling. Each of these has specific applications, depending on the type of products being palletized, such as the size of products, and other considerations. You need to go through a set of determinations to decide what kind of tooling you will need for your automated palletizing. The correct decision here will help to maximize production rates, optimize your speed of production, and maximize your return on investment. To decide correctly you will need to look in detail at the attributes of the products that will be candidates for palletization. Important attributes that should be considered are weight, shape, and dimensions of products, stability and outer construction, and wrapping, taping, and sealing of outer construction. You should determine if products need to be supported underneath and can packages support themselves while being moved. A most important determination is the speed at which your palletizing will need to run in order to support the optimum production rate. Sometimes tooling may not be appropriate for a high-speed processing scenario, so changing to another tool will meet the requirements. There may be a range of speeds at which the production line can run. It may be possible to adjust the rate to get the best tool for palletizing products. The abilities of tooling types vary. Some of the tooling types have the flexibility to position graphics for pallets that will be on display, while others do not. A finished pallet of products may need slip sheets between layers which can effect production rates and the types of tooling that is required. There may need to be a second tool that adds the slip sheet to each layer while a primary tool loads products. The vacuum type of end- tool for palletizing is the most widely used. The pneumatic cups that are on the end of the tool are placed on the top of the packages. The vacuum that is created in each cups allows the automation to lift the product up and then place it on the pallet. The best application of this tool is in the movement of products that are very sturdy and can handle being transferred without support underneath. Products that have a high center of gravity can be moved quite readily. Fork type tools use a lot of area in the process of lifting products from the bottom by sliding under them. The tool is best applied with irregular shaped products or those that are in bags. The increased amount of motion with this tool makes it slower, but the product configuration may dictate that it be used anyway. Side clamp tooling can be used for packaging that can be lifted by having clamps on opposite side of the product apply equal pressure in order to left the product. This tooling device can generate high-speed and has better control than the other types of tooling. This tooling is best if there is a requirement to manufacture several types of products from the same line. It is easily adjusted to the different attributes of products. Layer handling tools are the most expensive because there are two stages of tooling that are required for palletization. The first tool has to create the layer of products, the second then adds the layer to the pallet. This method is useful for trays of products that are open at the top. As you can see the product attributes will usually dictate the type of tooling and the way that your products are palletized for delivery to your customers. Sometimes the customer will also have some sway in the way this is done. About the author of this article: john mitchell is president of provision, inc, an online publisher of information about the application of automation in manufacturing. the company website, http://www.provinc.net , assists companies in the evaluation of the benefits of automated material handling . requests for quotations for automation can be submitted to the consulting engineers of leading automation companies.
Category:	Business: Ask-an-Expert
Date:	April 24, 2011 08:03:01 AM

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