Warehouse Technology – Evaluating New Trends
by Jungheinrich®
Like most industries today, the distribution industry is seeing a strong need to do more with less. It is driven by two key forces: the operations managers’ search for innovative solutions to control costs and a drive to increase efficiency in the warehouse.
Over the last few years, there has been a rising trend in the use of lift truck technology, such as warehouse automation, to satisfy the demands for reduced costs and increased productivity. Factors such as warehouse layout, aisle size, picking methods, equipment and navigation systems all play an impact on the warehouse’s overall productivity and order picking accuracy.
There is no cookie cutter approach for selecting lift truck equipment. The solution is really dependent on the particular warehouse and includes an evaluation of the warehouse and its specific needs. The right system will fully leverage best space utilization, productivity gains, increased accuracies and overall costs reductions.
Lift Truck Navigation Options
Today’s warehouse manager has three choices for reaching destinations within a warehouse:
- Manual systems – Traditionally, most warehouses have relied on the use of manual forklifts to move products. While flexible and productive, this approach can also have a higher labor cost and a lower level of efficiency and accuracy.
- Fully-automated selections – A fully-automated option, such as an automated storage or retrieval system, boasts improvements in productivity but tends to be more capital-intensive and inflexible once integrated into the warehouse.
- Hybrid (or flexible) alternatives – Semi-automated systems are a hybrid of manual and fully automated systems, which give operators the ability to benefit from navigation technology, with the flexibility to drive and control the truck. Hybrid approaches are built on a Warehouse Navigation System, which uses either indoor GPS, 2-D bar code tracking systems or RFID transponders (a floor-embedded control system) to locate, guide and navigate very narrow aisle lift trucks within the aisles of a warehouse.
New Hybrid Approaches
Hybrid approaches are becoming a more common consideration for today’s high velocity warehouse. Many operations are looking for ways to increase productivity and efficiency by automating routine processes, such as determining and navigating to a product in the shortest, most efficient path possible. The hybrid approach also maintains flexibility for the operator, allowing them to retain some control as needed when operating the truck. The combination can be powerful, especially in very narrow aisle applications.
Semi-automated systems often come in one of three different types:
- The indoor GPS – This approach tracks lift truck locations through a network of ground-based transmitters, which has better accuracy than satellite-based GPS systems. However, the downside is that these systems lack the ability to collect lift truck performance data, which can be used to improve efficiency and productivity.
- The 2-D Bar Code Tracking System – which utilizes a truck-mounted camera and ceiling-mounted tiles to provide efficient travel path information to the lift truck operator. The system has exceptional accuracy in wide aisle and very narrow aisle applications, but these can often come with a higher installation cost, making it cost prohibitive for some applications.
- RFID technology – relies on the use of floor-embedded RFID “transponders” to communicate with RFID readers mounted onboard the lift truck. With this technology, the system determines the lift truck’s precise location while guiding through the aisle and automatically adjusts the lift truck’s performance and navigation to match the pick location requirements to the task at hand. This type of system provides the ability to control and determine the travel speed, lift height, lowering height, audible truck alarms, direct communication with the warehouse management system to locate specific shelf locations, and auxiliary and ancillary lift truck functions. Since the system relies on transponders embedded in the floor, it can be easily reprogrammed if a rack row changes in the warehouse aisle, adapting the system to the new location. Today, this is a unique technology offered on Jungheinrich® turret trucks and high level order pickers, allowing very narrow aisle applications to utilize this semi-automation technology to increase productivity up to 25% depending on the application.
Finding Your Solution
The right system will fully leverage best space utilization, productivity gains, increased accuracies and overall costs reductions. However, each warehouse is unique and managers should consider a warehouse evaluation from a qualified expert to find the optimal solution. Warehouse managers interested in learning more about the range of technologies available today should read the Determining The Right Lift Truck Navigation System white paper.
