Conveyor automation boosts warehouse efficiency
October 14th 2008 An automated conveyor system capable of handling up to 30 cartons a minute with minimal manual handling has been completed for wines and spirits wholesaler Waverley TBS by European Conveyor Systems.
Waverley’s DC at Hemel Hempstead, including a conveyor system installed by ECS in 2000, was badly damaged by the explosion at the nearby Buncefield oil storage depot in December 2005. As part of the rebuilding project Waverley took the opportunity to further automate the order-picking process.
The original ECS conveyor system had been designed to separate full case picking from single bottle picking in order to speed up warehouse operations. A special picking system nick-named Fast Alley was created solely for single bottles, involving a separate semi-intelligent conveyor system serving an area with live storage modules.
As before, the re-built distribution centre allows for all orders to be planned, picked and despatched using paperless systems. In Fast Alley, hand held computer terminals scan a unique bar code on each tray, telling the operative which product location to visit and how many bottles to pick. Once the orders in that pick area have been completed, the conveyor system automatically moves cartons to the next pick area until the order is fulfilled.
Cartons with completed orders are now check-weighed, strapped and labelled automatically by machines integrated into the conveyor system, whereas fully picked orders used to be manually checked, sealed and labelled. They then pass on to a sortation conveyor and are diverted into a predetermined despatch spur, with a by-pass lane provided for non-standard items or cartons that are over or under weight.
Cold store pallet conveyor
A heavy-duty conveyor system has been installed by ECS at McCain Foods’ production unit near Peterborough to carry shrinkwrapped palletised loads from production to cold store while providing buffer storage to reduce bottlenecks. The equipment carries pallets from a stretch wrapper to one of two zero-pressure accumulation conveyors, depending on where the product is required in the cold store, with pallets being routed to the correct lane by a chain transfer or turntable. The conveyors provide non-contact queuing and so act as buffer storage. Fork lift trucks offload pallets at the end of each conveyor, with sensors detecting their position for safe operation.
The system can handle GKN Chep pallets measuring 1200mm x 1000mm and weighing up to 1000kg with a nominal maximum throughput of 120 pallets an hour.
It has a programmable control system that also provides system status information.
Goods lifts on the up
Installation of four Gebhardt goods lifts at IKEA’s distribution centres in Dublin and Belfast has taken the total number installed by ECS in the UK past the 150 mark, including multiple installations for Next, Mothercare and other leading retailers.
ECS has already completed installations at IKEA DCs in Coventry and Nottingham and installed four lifts at Mothercare’s national distribution centre in Northamptonshire as part of a £550,000 goods handling system.
Other recent customers include Amazon, Davies Turner Logistics and Snow and Rock.
Gebhardt lifts are fully free-standing and selfcontained, requiring no civil engineering work or welding, and are available in goods-only and personnel versions with load capacities from one tonne to two tonnes in a wide range of sizes. Maximum operating height is 12 metres, and provision can be made for up to six stopping places and 12 access points. More articles from European Conveyor Systems Ltd: | 
