Opal came to us with a blank sheet of paper looking for a solution to automate their reel handling process. Our customer requests were very clear: improved Health & Safety, increased production capability, reduced reliance on labour and compliance to a higher hygiene standard.
With operators at each of their seven production lines having to manually handle long and heavy shafts (>2m and up to 70kg) the need to improve health and safety was a key driver.
The customer’s manual operation had required forklifts to transport the 1.5T reels between the warehouse and production environments. A second motivation was to increase hygiene compliance by removing this potential for cross contamination.
Our solution centralised the reel shafting and de-shafting process. This allowed a single operator to prepare the reels for all seven lines while at the same time creating a single transfer point between the warehouse and high hygiene production area.
Line operators can now request reels for the production run from field mounted RML Human Machine Interfaces. These connect to a centralised database and allow the ‘reelman’ to feed the required reels into the automated cell where they are prepped before entering the automated shafting process.
An ABB IRB7600 handles the heavy shafts and stillages. We installed vision and laser technology to achieve the high accuracy (<1mm) requirements.
Shafts were equipped with RFID tags to enable tracking and validation. Once a shaft is inserted into the reel a specified distance, it is then inflated to lock onto each reel and then hoisted onto a stillage frame and conveyed into the high hygiene area.
A similar process is then performed in reverse.
As the shafts, reels and stillages are heavy, advanced automatic fault handling and recovery needed to be integrated into the design to ensure any operator involvement was minimal.
An AGV operating in the high-hygiene zone transports the reels to and from each of the production lines thus removing any manual forklifts from the production area.
RML have an amazing team of people. They were easy to work with and were happy to assist with any problems we encountered during the design and commissioning process.
We’ve been so impressed by the level of service and quality of machinery that RML have built for us. With such an efficient machine, we’ve had no problem keeping up with production times and demands.
Working with RML on an innovative solution was straightforward. Their in-house expertise in all aspects of the design and build added value to the project delivery process and made some tough challenges easier to overcome.
Our experience working with RML has been positive. We feel we received value for our investment.
The machine provided by RML has to date, resulted in consistent high-quality product for SNPshot Technologies and guaranteed production costs.
We saw a 30% increase in line speed and output as a result of the RML equipment
The trust and reliance that has grown from this project has us achieving numnbers we previously did not think would be possible. We will be searching for opportunities to collaborate with RML in future.
Our integrated, advanced operation ensures the best quality cream cheese is produced consistently.
It was an opportunity to increase the packing line automation, with labour savings offsetting the capital costs.
RML worked with us to understand our requirements and designed a solution to suit our needs. RML delivered an automated system to service two moulding machines producing the Gallagher Ring Top Posts.
We set RML a challenge, design and build a new butter packing machine for a challenging application. RML produced a smart and effective solution that exceeded our expectations.
Ongoing service and support is important to us. RML knew this and I am pleased to say we are not disappointed. I have and will continue to recommend RML to others in our industry based on our experience
IF YOU HAVE A PRODUCTION CHALLENGE,
WE’D LOVE TO SOLVE IT.
