The Material Handling Blog

Building, storing and moving pallets is often what most people think of when they hear the word “warehouse.” And they’re not entirely wrong, pallet handling operations are critical to the effective flow and performance of many manufacturing and distribution facilities. Outbound pallet handling is often the focus of most companies in this space, as these processes appear to be most impactful to the end-customer. However, inbound pallet handling operations can be equally important to the overall production and fulfillment process. Manual palletizing and movement of inbound product in distribution and manufacturing centers often presents challenges due to labor-intensive processes, ergonomic concerns and safety risks. To address these issues, automation can be implemented to streamline operations and improve efficiency.

Analyzing the tasks, rates and capabilities can help not only maximize the robotic system but also help reduce the need for ancillary equipment and additional investments, creating a more streamline operation.

Find out how pallet positioners like the PalletPal™ can make loading and unloading pallets faster, safer, and easier for your workforce..

“Garbage in, garbage out.” As this phrase applies to robotic palletizing systems, the system outputs, particularly built pallet quality and throughput rates, are directly tied to the quality of the system inputs. To avoid issues, it's critical to ensure quality products, pallets as well as downstream and upstream processes. Read: How to Avoid Common Pitfalls of Robotic Palletizing System Startups

When looking for a pallet handling solution, knowing the key questions to be answered and the crucial information regarding your product and process is critical.

One of the most vital parts of any palletizing system is a pallet dispenser. Pallet dispensers automate the infeed of an empty pallet at regular intervals into the system. This automatic infeed increases the overall efficiency of the system by leaving operators available to tend to different parts of the same line, or even a different line altogether. Read: Pallet Dispenser Essentials

Selecting an industrial lift table can be overwhelming. Between sizes and options there are literally thousands of configurations to choose from. When making your selection, it’s important to consider what is being lifted, how it needs to be lifted, how the lift table should operate, and whether any safety features are required. Ask yourself the following questions to ensure you select the best lift table for your operation. Read: How to Select a Lift Table

With limited fork lift resources, one manufacturer installed a pallet handling system that used a lift table, floor pit, and pallet conveyor to improve cycle times and reduce traffic in a busy assembly area.

Most of us don’t consider our material handling equipment to be among our closest friends. After all, what has a conveyor, cart or pallet jack ever done for you? However, there is one piece of equipment that you might want to consider adding to your Christmas card list – the Southworth PalletPal 360™.

I spend much of my time in manufacturing facilities dealing with material handling issues related to moving and positioning pallets, plastic bulk box containers, steel racks, and multi-footed thermoformed pallets. Often times, we are given very little information on these objects, let alone the details of the bottom surface. This prompted me to write about the importance of this often skipped over, yet extremely important topic.