Top Handle

Top Handle

Automate Your Material Handling and Stop Hemorrhaging Profits

It is true that any kind of material movement will not add one bit of benefit to any product in production, but it can certainly make a big gash in your profits if you do not use it and manage it well. This idea is also true for automated material handling. The functionality of automated material handling should be designed to make the movement of raw materials and products through the production process more efficient. This will certainly increase the productivity of either manufacturing or warehousing operations. Automated material handling will increase the utilization of plant space and equipment, improve safe working conditions, reduce handling costs and capital outlays.

The general steps that you might take in order to design effective automated material handling could be as follows:

Determine what the handling is to do

Determine what are the handling and controlling requirements

Decide what are the alternatives for handling solution

Pick a handling solution that fits your requirements

Implement it

To capture the benefits that automated material handling can make available to your company there are certain principles that you must understand about the implementation of this. Your staff must plan for the automation of material movement by studying the needs and requirements of your manufacturing to get clear vision of what are the constraints of material movement and what the are the potential solutions. Any design of automated material movement that is developed should also include an indication of how data should flow along with it. The data is required for invoices, packing lists, statements, and other reporting concerning material movements. Most of the time the data flow that occurs with the movement of material happens virtually in the company network where raw materials can be moved from inventory and put into production by changing an indicator in a database. Both data and instructions to the handling devices to make movements travel over the network for efficiency. Planning should be ardent about making movement of material as simple as possible, after all the less material is handled, the better for the bottom line. Along with minimum movements, a minimum amount of energy should be used in material movement. Using gravity is a great way to save expensive energy.

In planning for automated material movement you will need to discover the cost, efficiency, and effectiveness of alternatives to scope out the comparative performance of your selected solution. It is a good idea to always try to standardize the methods and handling equipment to get the most out of maintenance that is done and spare parts that might need to be used in repairs. Always setup the movement of loads with the maximum load that is possible to transport so as to minimize trips and maximize economy. A benefit that goes along with standardization is that the equipment and methods should be flexible enough to be used in more than one capacity. This will keep capital expenditures down for equipment that needs to be purchased. Build into the plan for handling devices the need for periodic maintenance and prepare in advance for equipment obsolescence.

It is important to take into account the human operators that are required to operate any handling devices that are to be used in your company. The capabilities, limits and safety of all employees are mandatory considerations when creating this type of movement system. The entire material handling operation should be integrated into one system to include transportation, warehousing, receiving, shipping, order picking, packaging, inspection, and production. The effort of the movement of any raw materials, parts, or products should be a seamless operation from the starting point of movement to the ending point of movement. All this movement is best coordinated by a network that has the handling controller as part of its devices. Instructions for movement can be sent over the network to fully automate movements from place to place.

There will need to be a plan in place to decide where the parts of the handling devices will be placed in the operating area so that they can integrate effectively with the production and other types of equipment. There may need to be a redesign of the plant or warehouse floor layout to accommodate the most optimum positions so that all the equipment can work together effectively. The integration of handling devices into the other areas of production and warehousing should be scrutinized very well. The relationship of storage areas and the ability to move raw materials and products can be critical, if there are storage considerations or there are sensitive products involved. Order picking can be another area that needs special fine tuning when needs to have near proximity to automation of material movement.

About the Author

John Mitchell is President of Provision, Inc, an online publisher of information about the application of automation in manufacturing. Mitchell has years of experience in the management of manufacturing, warehousing, and transportation. The company website, <a href="http://www.provinc.net">http://www.provinc.net</a>, assists companies in the evaluation of the benefits and capabilities of <a href="<a href="http://www.provinc.net/material-handling-landing/">http://www.provinc.net/material-handling-landing/">automated material handling</a>. Thoughts on how to evaluate automation for a business are presented, and ways to begin the automation process are discussed. Insights into the use of vision systems, RFID and other topics in automation are covered. Requests for quotations and questions about automation can be submitted to the consulting engineers of leading automation companies.

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