Do you know that 80% of all items are transported on a pallet sooner or later of their journey?
Should you’re counting on handbook labor to put your merchandise on pallets, you are not alone. Nonetheless, the final decade has pushed factories of all sizes in numerous industries, reminiscent of meals and beverage, prescription drugs, and basic manufacturing, to rethink workforce utilization and undertake palletizing robots.
Whether or not you are going through labor shortages, excessive insurance coverage prices because of office accidents, or the necessity to shut effectivity and productiveness gaps to make sure progress, automating your end-of-line processes is a vital transformation mission to prioritize.
This text gives an outline of the sorts of automated palletizers, how they function, their affect on your enterprise, and the steps to implement one.
What’s an Automated Palletizer?
An automatic palletizer is a robotic system designed to mechanically organize and stack merchandise or packages onto pallets for transport, storage, or distribution. It makes use of superior expertise to carry out duties historically completed by handbook labor, reminiscent of choosing up objects from a conveyor belt and inserting them in particular patterns on a pallet.
The two Kinds of Automated Palletizers
Automated palletizers will be categorized into 2 principal classes: Conventional robots or Industrial robots and collaborative robots (cobots)
Conventional robots (industrial) excel in high-volume, repetitive duties, dealing with heavy payloads at excessive speeds. They require important funding, giant footprints, security fencing, and specialised employees for operation and upkeep.
Collaborative robots (cobots), however, prioritize flexibility and adaptableness. They work safely alongside people (with a correct danger evaluation) with out in depth limitations and are simply reprogrammable for various duties. Cobots are typically extra reasonably priced and space-efficient, making them appropriate for smaller operations or restricted ground areas. Nonetheless, they sometimes have decrease payload capacities and function at slower speeds than conventional robots.
The selection between conventional robots and cobots is dependent upon particular operational wants. Elements to contemplate embrace manufacturing quantity, process selection, out there house, price range, and workforce talent degree.
Conventional robots swimsuit large-scale, high-speed operations, whereas cobots supply versatility and accessibility for numerous or altering manufacturing environments.
Advantages of Automating Palletizing
Lower Labor Prices and Overcome Worker Shortage
Guide palletizing incurs important labor prices, together with wages, advantages, additional time, and bills associated to hiring and coaching because of turnover. Factories additionally face greater upkeep and downtime prices from employee absences, holidays, and departures, resulting in manufacturing delays. The recurring bills of recruiting and coaching replacements add substantial overhead, significantly in high-turnover industries.
There is a clear development away from jobs involving strenuous handbook duties like heavy lifting, that are each bodily taxing and mentally unfulfilling. This choice is mirrored in financial knowledge, based on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, 45% of sturdy items manufacturing jobs in the US stay vacant.
The labor shortages producers face right this moment are prone to persist. Deloitte predicts in its 2024 manufacturing business outlook report that even when each expert employee in America have been employed, there would nonetheless be 35% extra unfilled job openings within the sturdy items manufacturing sector than out there expert employees. By 2030, they mission a scarcity of greater than two million American manufacturing employees.
Automating palletizing permits your useful staff to do extra and develop together with your firm. As an employer of alternative, cut back your dependency on hard-to-find labor and create jobs that individuals wish to do.
Acquire productiveness and effectivity
Automated palletizers can function 24/7 which drastically will increase output in comparison with handbook processes. This enhance is important for assembly rising demand or seizing new market alternatives. Producers unable to spend money on automated palletizing might lose market share to extra agile rivals.
By adopting superior automated programs, you may outpace rivals with superior effectivity, high quality, and cost-effectiveness. This allows you to supply higher costs and better high quality merchandise with pallet consistency, securing your market place and profitable extra contracts.
Automated cobot palletizers are recognized to supply flexibility and adaptableness – they’re normally straightforward to program to altering wants. This flexibility retains you agile in a dynamic market, making certain long-term progress and competitiveness.
Present a safer office
Automating your palletizing cell can considerably cut back the danger of accidents associated to repetitive motions, heavy lifting, and publicity to hazardous supplies. Producers who don’t automate might face greater insurance coverage premiums and potential prices associated to office accidents and related litigation.
Guide materials dealing with, which incorporates palletizing, is a major danger issue for MSDs. Based on the Nationwide Institute for Occupational Security and Well being , about 30% of overexertion accidents within the office have been related to lifting duties
Automating your palletizing course of reduces prices, addresses labor shortages, boosts productiveness, and creates a safer work surroundings. This allows your staff to tackle extra significant duties and ensures constant pallet high quality, prioritizing your buyer and model.
How you can Get Began with Automated Palletizing
Step 1: Define your enterprise wants
Automating your palletizing cell course of begins by outlining your enterprise challenges and alternatives. At Robotiq, we have now developed a complete grid, the Strategic Crucial Framework.
Designed to be a thought-provoking course of, it guides stakeholders in ‘scoring’ their challenges to unravel and covers completely different elements of automating duties (course of, engineering, upkeep, individuals and finance). Spending time at this step is inspired to align the choice course of in the proper strategic route.
Step 2: Choose the proper answer
Understanding the present market panorama is a essential step. Choosing an choice with out contemplating all out there options would possibly lead to overlooking viable options. It’s important to undertake this step earlier than committing to anybody answer.
For a basic overview, the out there options will be divided into two main classes: Conventional robots and Collaborative robots.
Conventional Robots
Collaborative Robots
Finest answer for factories with ..
– a excessive quantity of the identical product to palletize – a relentless manufacturing quantity all year long – greater than 1 shift of operation – packing containers to palletize weighing over 30kg (66 lbs) – multiple operator doing handbook palletizing
– a low to medium quantity of manufacturing – product selection to palletize – demand fluctuations or anticipated progress – packing containers to palletize weighing lower than 30kg (66 lbs) – greater than 1 operator doing handbook palletizing
Advantages and benefits
– Excessive effectivity and velocity – Excessive payload functionality – Sturdy and dependable
– Small footprint – Extremely cellular – Intuitive software program – Quick lead time and integration time – Quick payback interval
Drawbacks and dangers
– Giant footprint – Excessive preliminary funding – Improve ripple impact – Requires experience to function – Restricted flexibility – Dependence on vendor for including new merchandise
– Very restricted throughput and pallet peak (until a vertical linear axis is used) – Can not carry out duties not included within the software program – Capabilities not extendable utilizing conventional automation strategies
Every of those classes contains numerous palletizing options, every with its personal distinctive advantages and dangers. For an in depth evaluation of the options out there in the marketplace, we invite you to obtain the Automated Palletizing Purchaser’s Information.
Step 3: Consider the Price
As a basic estimate, a collaborative robotic palletizer for a small to medium-sized operation can vary from $50,000 to $150,000, whereas the standard robotic palletizer can price upwards of $500,000 or extra. When evaluating the whole price of an automatic palletizing system, it is best to undertake a complete method that considers each preliminary and ongoing bills, in addition to future scalability and suppleness.
Listed here are the important thing factors to contemplate:
1. Price Parts
Preliminary Funding: Consists of the acquisition worth, integration with present programs, customization to fulfill particular wants, and potential vendor lock-in.
Working Prices: Embody power consumption, upkeep and repairs, coaching for employees, and software program updates or licensing charges.
Further Prices: Think about bills associated to downtime and the price of scaling or adjusting the system sooner or later.
2. Price range Concerns
Price range Pricing vs. Quoted Pricing: Distinguish between estimated price range prices and precise worth quotes to make sure correct comparisons. Concentrate on distributors’ beneficial contingency funds for surprising bills.
Important vs. Good-to-Have Options: Clearly outline which options are essential in your operations and that are elective. Use detailed specs to prioritize important options and eradicate pointless ones, doubtlessly requesting revised quotes from distributors.
3. Preliminary Funding Elements
Integration: Assess how nicely the palletizing system will align together with your manufacturing unit format, processes, and present programs. Ask distributors about compatibility, required modifications, and examples of profitable integrations.
Customization: Decide if the system meets your important necessities out-of-the-box or if extra customization is required, each initially and over time to keep up performance.
Vendor Lock-In: Think about the long-term implications of counting on a selected vendor, together with the way it would possibly have an effect on scalability, flexibility, and future prices.
Scalability: Consider whether or not the system can develop together with your wants, the prices related to upgrades, and if it permits for incremental investments as necessities evolve.
4. Working Prices Particulars
Vitality Prices: Fluctuate primarily based on system effectivity, utilization length, and native electrical energy charges.
Upkeep and Repairs: Common repairs is crucial. Perceive who will carry out upkeep, the phrases of service contracts, and the supply of spare elements.
Coaching Prices: Issue within the bills for coaching staff to function and keep the system successfully.
Programming and Software program Updates: Account for software program licensing charges, subscription prices, and whether or not updates or programming adjustments require exterior assist.
5. Sensible Ideas for Analysis
Vendor Questions: Put together particular questions on integration capabilities, customization choices, scalability, and assist providers to make sure the system meets your wants.
Price Monitoring: Preserve an in depth file of all potential bills to attain a extra correct estimate of each preliminary and ongoing prices.
Step 4: Calculate your ROI
Now, understanding the preliminary and possession prices from the earlier chapter, the subsequent logical step is to mission the Return on Funding (ROI). Listed here are the formulation and components that needs to be thought-about to calculate your return on funding:
PRODUCTIVITY GAINS
Cycle time: Length to finish a selected process or produce an merchandise.
Output: Variety of models processed per unit of time.
Scalability: Capacity to extend quantity with minimal extra price.
LABOR IMPACT
Labor prices: Present handbook labor prices, together with wages and advantages.
Labor effectivity: Productiveness and effectivity of handbook labor.
Labor flexibility: Capacity to reassign labor for numerous duties.
COST OF OWNERSHIP
To outline the whole price of possession, the operation prices needs to be added to the preliminary funding by contemplating a selected interval (sometimes predefined by the enterprise) for every answer within the comparability.
INVESTMENT RISK ASSESSMENT
Any funding can have dangers. It is very important think about them and have a mitigation plan in the event that they occur.
Establish dangers: Potential dangers reminiscent of technological failures, market adjustments, or regulatory points.
Danger mitigation: Doc methods to mitigate every danger and calculate the potential price related to mitigation.
Embody a danger consider your ROI comparability: Take a look at your manufacturing unit’s earlier, large-scale, cross-functional funding initiatives. Had been they on time and on price range? If not, add that danger issue to your ROI calculation for conventional robots palletizing options.
INTANGIBLE BENEFITS
These will not be clear numbers, however they’re qualitative positive factors that must be thought-about in your resolution course of.
Security: Lower prices related to office accidents, medical depart, accidents, and near-misses.
Worker engagement: Consider the affect on workforce morale and the rise in worker retention.
High quality enchancment: Calculate the discount of prices associated to errors.
Market status: Estimate the optimistic affect on the corporate’s status (each with clients and job candidates) for innovation and effectivity.
Depalletizing: What You Must Know
Depalletizing is the method of systematically eradicating packing containers, luggage, or different packaged objects from a loaded pallet. It’s usually step one in a producing or distribution course of, the place uncooked supplies or completed items arrive on a pallet and must be unpacked.
Key Variations Between Palletizing and Depalletizing:
Unloading Challenges: With palletizing, the robotic has full management over the position of things on the pallet. Depalletizing entails unloading a pallet that was loaded by another person, so the merchandise positions could also be unpredictable.
Merchandise Motion in Transit: Pallets can shift throughout transportation, inflicting the objects on the pallet to maneuver from their unique positions. Depalletizing programs should be capable of account for this motion, in contrast to palletizing.
Robotic Imaginative and prescient Necessities: Depalletizing usually requires the usage of robotic imaginative and prescient programs to adapt to the uncertainty of the pallet format, whereas palletizing can generally be completed with out imaginative and prescient.
Upstream/Downstream Processes: Palletizing sometimes happens on the finish of the manufacturing workflow, whereas depalletizing occurs at the start, interacting with completely different processes.
Facility Structure: Palletizing and depalletizing programs are sometimes positioned in numerous areas inside a facility to optimize their integration with upstream and downstream operations.
Understanding these key variations is necessary when deploying robotic automation for palletizing and depalletizing duties.
Conclusion
Automated palletizers enhance productiveness, tackle labor shortages, and improve office security. They improve throughput, take away bodily demanding duties, and cut back damage dangers – offering a aggressive edge for factories. Investing in automated palletizing is a strategic transfer to streamline operations and place your group for long-term progress.