Chap 6

MATERIAL HANDLING

Luu Van Thanh

 Lecture outline
1. Introduction
2. Material handling principles
3. Designing material handling systems
4. Unit load design
5. Material handling equipment
6. Estimating material handling costs
7. Safety considerations

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I. Introduction
• Material Handling accounts for:
– 25% of all employees,
– 55% of all factory space,
– 87% of production time
– 15-70% of the total cost of a manufactured product

• 3-5% of all material handled becomes damaged

– “Totally eliminate”
– However, handling less is not the answer.

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 Definitions:
• Material handling (MH) is the art and science of moving, storing,
protecting, and controlling of goods and materials.
– Moving: Required to create time and place utility. The value of
having the material at the right time and the right place.
– Storing: Provides a buffer between operations, facilitates the
efficient use of people and machines.
– Protecting: Includes the packaging, packing against damage
and theft.
– Controlling: Physical: Orientation, sequence and space
between material.
Status: Real-time awareness of the location, amount,
destination, origin, ownership, and schedule of material.

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 Definitions:
• MH means providing the right amount of the right material, in
the right condition, at the right place, in the right position, in
the right sequence, and for the right cost, by the right
methods.
- Right amount: how much inventory is needed?
- Right material
- Right condition: state in which customer desires the material
- Right sequence
- Right place: address both transportation and storage
- Right time: on-time delivery
- Right cost: not necessary the lowest cost
- Right method.
II. MH Principles

1. Planning
9. Environmental 10. Life Cycle Cost

2. Standardization
8. Automation

MH
7. System 3. Work principle

6. Space Utilization 4. Ergonomic

5. Unit load

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 Conditions for improvement
System not capable Idle production
No pre-kitting of of change or equipment due to
work expansion material shortage

Material piled
Automatic data
directly on floor
collection system
not used
MH
Backtracking of In-plant containers
material not standardized

Operators travel
Misdirected material excessively for
materials and
Excessive
supplies
demurrage
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III. Designing material handling systems (MHS)

Six-step engineering design process:

1. Define the objectives and scope for the material handling system.
2. Analyze the requirements for moving, storing, protecting, and
controlling material.
3- Generate alternative designs for meeting material handling
system requirements.
4. Evaluate alternative material handling system designs.
5. Select the preferred design for moving, storing, protecting, and
controlling material.
6. Implement the preferred design, including the selection of
suppliers, training of personnel, installation, debug and startup of
equipment, and periodic audits of system performance.
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1. Developing Alternative MHS Designs

NADLER’s IDEALS approach:

1. Aim for the theoretical ideal system.

2. Conceptualize the ultimate ideal system.
3. Design the technologically workable ideal system.
4. Install the recommended system.

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 2. The MHS equation & questions
The What Question
1. What are the types of material to be moved?
2. What are their characteristics?
3. What are the amounts moved and stored?
The Where Question
• Where is the material coming from? Where should it
come from?
• Where is the material delivered? Where should it be
delivered?
• Where is the material stored? Where should it be
stored?
• Where can material handling tasks be eliminated,
combined or simplified?
• Where can you apply mechanization or automation?
The When Question
1. When is material needed? When should it be moved?
2. When is it time to mechanize or automate?
3. When should we conduct a material handling
performance audit?
The MHS equation:
Materials + Moves +
Methods =
Recommended systems
The How Question
1. How is the material moved or stored? How should
material be moved or stored? What are the alternative
ways of moving or storing the material?
2. How much inventory should be maintained?
3- How is the material tracked? How should the material
be tracked?
4. How should the problem be analyzed?
The Who Question
1. Who should be handling material? What are the
required skills to perform the material handling tasks?
2. Who should be trained to service and maintain the
material handling system?
3. Who should be involved in designing the system?
The Which Question
1. Which material handling operations are necessary?
2. Which type of material handling equipment, if any,
should be considered?
3. Which material handling system is cost effective?
4. Which alternative is preferred? 10
3. MH planning chart

Fig 05_02: MH planning chart for an air flow regulator.

Key: Operation – O, Transportation – T, Storage – S, Inspection – I. 11
IV. UNIT LOAD design
“Picked up and moved between two
locations as a single mass”
Example:
1. a single item picked up and moved
manually between two locations
2. Two tote pans with identical
components picked up moved by a
dolly from one machine to another
3. One pallet load of nonuniform-size
cartons with different products
picked up and moved by a lift truck
from the packaging area to the
shipping dock
4. One full load of products delivered
by a trucktrailer from a warehouse
to a customer store If the trailer is
half full, it is still one unit load.
Larger unit load:
+ fewer moves
- bigger and heavier equipment
- wider aisles
- higher floor load capacities
- increased work-in-process inventory
Smaller unit load:
+ reduced work-in-process inventory
+ simple material handling methods
(i.e., push carts)
+ reduced completion time (How??)
- more moves
- increased material handling time
“Achieving single unit production
requires the materail handling time to
be shorter than the unit processing
time.”
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Fig 05_03
illustrates the effects
of the unit load size
on job completion
times

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Fig 05_04
shows several
stages in the
material flow
process where
dimensional
relationships
play a major
role.

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Fig 05_05
shows why
these two
features
play key
roles in
moving
and storing
containers

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 Efficiency of returnable containers
• Given the following dimensions of a plastic reusable containers:
– Inside dimensions: 18” x 11” x 11”
– Outside dimensions: 20” x 12” x 12”
– Each nested container: 20” x 12” x 2”
– The storage opening : 24” x 16” x 14”
A trailer with inside dimensions of 240” x 120” x 120” is used to transport these containers.
Assume no clearance is needed.

Determine the following:

1. Container space utilization: container efficiency: (18” x 11” x 11”)/(20” x 12” x 12”) = 0.76
2. Storage space efficiency : (18” x 11” x 11”)/(24” x 16” x 14”) = 0.45
3. Container nesting ratio: 12”/2” = 6: the ratio is 6:1
4. Trailer space utilization if all containers are stacked vertically in only one orientation
i. In the trailer length: 240”/20” = 12 containers
ii. In the trailer width: 120”/ 12’ = 10 containers
iii. In the stack vertically: 120”/ 12’ = 10 containers
iv. The total numbers of containers: 12x10x10 = 1200.
v. The trailer space utilization: (18” x 11” x 11”)(1200)/(240” x 120” x 120”) = 0.76
5. Trailer return ratio
i. Number empty containers of one stack 1 + (120” -12”)/2” = 55
ii. Total no. of empty containers per trailer : 55 x (240”/20”) x (120”/12”) = 6600
iii. The trailer return ratio: 6600/1200 = 5.5
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Significant cost reduction may be achieved with higher trailer return ratios.
Fig 05_06
Shows a
container/pallet
system with
progressive
dimensions.

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Unit load interactions with warehouse components

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The pallet loading pattern for each carton-pallet pair must be prescribed
as shown in two above figures.

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V. Material handling equipment
Categories of Material Handling Equipment
1. Containers and Unitizing Equipment
• Containers
• Unitizers
2. Material Transport Equipment
• Conveyors
• Industrial Vehicles
• Monorails, Hoists, and Cranes
3. Storage and Retrieval Equipment
• Unit Load Storage and Retrieval
• Unit Load Storage Equipment
• Unit Load Retrieval Equipment
• Small Load Storage and Retrieval
4. Automatic Data Collection and Communication Equipment
• Automatic Identification and Recognition
• Automatic Paperless Communication 20
Containers: Tote pans
Containers: Pallets

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Unitizers: Palletizer Unitizers: Stretchwrapper

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Conveyors Automatic
identification and
recognition

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 Industrial Vehicles Storage and Retrieval

Monorails, Hoists and Cranes

Stock to operator: Carousels
VI. Estimating material handling costs

• The development of MH design alternatives covers

not just the specification of the “right method of
handling”.
• The recommended alternative is at the “right cost”.
• Estimation of the cost of MH alternatives is not a
trivial task.
• That is a “roughcut” method through the use of
standard data and rules of thumb.

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VII. Safety considerations
• The key to a safe facility is concentrating on the
interface between the workforce and the
equipment.
• The following table shows recommended aisle
widths for facility design.

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