Chapter 11

Material Handling Equipment

 Objectives
• After reading the chapter and reviewing the
materials presented the students will be able to:
• Identify various classifications of material
handling equipment.
• Select appropriate material handling equipment
for a given task.
 Introduction
• There are four traditional material handling equipment categories:
• 1. Fixed point or point to point equipment: Example is train on a railroad track.
Conveyor systems fall in this category.
• 2. Fixed area equipment: can serve any point within a fixed area. Example is a crane.
• 3. Variable path, variable area equipment: Example is all manual carts, motorized
vehicles and fork trucks.
• 4. Auxiliary tools and equipment: Example is pallets, skids, automated data collection
systems, and containers.
• The flow of material is from receiving to warehousing:
• 1. Receiving
• 2. Stores
• 3. Fabrication
• 4. Assembly and paint
• 5. Pack out
• 6. Warehousing
 Receiving and Shipping
• The height of the plant floor off the driveway or railbed should be 46
inches for trucks and 54 inches for boxcars.
• The driveways should slope away from the plant to prevent water
damage to the building foundation.
• Be sure the driveways can support the heavy weight of trailers.
• Overhead bridge cranes are often used to unload very heavy pallets
of steel.
• Finger docks are extensions to the plant and can handle many
trailers at one time. Freight companies use this type of dock to
unload and load many trailers at the same time (fig 11-2a, page
298). A carport like cover over the finger dock is important for
weather protection.
 Dock Equipment
• A trailer dock door is typically 9 x 9 foot roll up.
• Bumpers are placed outside the dock door
below the floor level to stop the trailer and to
protect both the building and the trailer from
collision damage.
• Sometimes air curtains and plastic curtains are
placed in doorways to minimize air loss from the
plant.
• Fig 11-3, page 300 shows a collection of dock
equipment.
 Moving Equipment
• Hand Carts:1. Two wheeled hand truck (fig 11-4, page 300)Up to 500 pounds can be moved. 2.
Pallet hand jack (fig 11-5, page 301) Up to 2000 pounds of material can be moved. 3. Four
wheeled hand carts (fig 11-6, page 301) Many things can be moved. 4. Pallets (fig 11-8, page
302) Pallet is an important piece of material handling equipment.
• Fork Trucks: Popular for loading and unloading trucks and railcars (fig 11-9, page 303).
• Multipurpose Equipment: Universal lift system (fig 11-10, page 305) can assist in lifting pallets,
boxes, and other containers. Cargo ships are loaded using very large cranes.
• Telescopic Conveyor: Telescopic conveyors have several sections of conveyor that extend as
needed (fig 11-12, page 307).
• Weight Scale: Weight scales assist in the quality control of receiving and shipping counts.
• Systems Required on Receiving and Shipping Docks: 1. Part numbering systems that allow
for identification of inventory. 2. Purchase order system authorizing the receiving of material. 3.
Customer order system authorizing the shipment of material. 4. Bill of lading authorizing a trucking
company to move material and to bill for their services.
 Stores
• Stores is the term used to describe the room where raw materials
and supplies are held until they are needed.
• The raw materials stores is usually the largest, but maintenance and
office supplies stores can be large as well.
• Storage Units: 1. Shelves store small parts. A typical shelving unit
has six 1 x 1 x 3 foot shelves one over the other (fig 11-14a, page
309). 2. Racks are generally used to store palletized material on
pallet racks (fig 11-14b, page 309). 3. Double deep pallet racks
allow for stacking 20 pallets on both sides of the aisle instead of 10
pallets (fig 11-4c, page 210). 4. Portable racks are racks that fit
over a pallet load of soft material. 5. Mezzanines can be built over
shelving areas to use the space over shelves(fig 11-4d, page 311).
6. Rolling shelves are popular in maintenance and office supply
stores. 7. Drawer storage units are used to store many small parts in
a small area (fig 11-14e, page 312).
 Stores Mobile Equipment
• Narrow aisle reach trucks are one of the better choices for maneuvering in storage
areas.
• 1. Reach truck. Has a scissor attachment on the forks allowing them to be extended
over 4 feet (fig 11-15, page 312).
• 2. Straddle truck. The truck can straddle a pallet on the floor allowing for more
stability and ability to lift heavier loads with lighter weight vehicle (fig 11-16, page
313).
• 3. Side Shifting Lift Trucks. Space conserving mobile equipment for storerooms (fig
11-17, page 314).
• 4. Maintenance carts. The cart is a small maintenance storeroom (fig 11-18, page
314).
• 5. Dollies and casters. Dollies placed under equipment can expedite moving (fig 11-
19, page 315).
• 6. Maintenance tool crib. Used for safe keeping of maintenance tools and supplies
(fig 11-20, page 315).
• 7. Carousel storage and retrieval system: Similar to the conveyor system at your dry
cleaner (fig 11-21, page 316). Has part numbers and bin numbers.
 Systems Required for the
Stores Department
• Locator System: Every location has an address and the warehouse
person must know how to reach any address.
• Kitting System: Kitting is the process of pulling together the parts
required for the next day’s production. This inventory is pulled from
the store room stock and placed on pallets or carts to be moved to
the assembly line for the next day’s work. Kitting needs space for
holding the material and material handling equipment to move it out
of the store room to production. If something was missing you have
16 to 24 hours to resolve the problem.
• Inventory Control System: Maintaining a proper level of inventory
is the function of inventory control. The movement of material into
and out of the store room must be reported and entered into the
inventory control system.
 Fabrication
• Fabrication starts with raw material and ends with finished parts.
• Shop Containers: are used to move parts in unit loads (fig 11-25,
page 318). Because they must be used over and over again, shop
containers must be durable, stackable, and portable.
• Tubs and Baskets: Regular sized tubs and baskets are 4 feet x 4
feet x 42 inches. (fig 11-26, page 319).
• Scissor Lifts or Hydraulic Lifts: A scissor lift will lift up a pallet of
material to keep the material in a comfortable height.
• Dump Hoppers: Will lift the tub and tilt it, spilling the parts on to a
slide that can bring the parts to the point needed.
 Manipulators and Lifting
Devices
• Manipulators are specifically designed to perform lifting, rotating, tilting, turning, and
positioning tasks that far exceed human capability.
• Vibratory Feeders: orient, feed, count, and present a part to the next operator. Rivets,
eyelets, screws, and bolts are fed into machines that use these fasteners by means
of vibratory feeders.
• Waste Disposal: Trash compactors reduce waste removal costs. Cutting fluids can be
recovered.
• Walking Beams: continually load and unload machines, eliminating the need for an
operator doing any material handling (fig 11- 34, page 327).
• Ball Tables: Ball bearings allow easy movement of heavy material.
• Jib Cranes: are lifting devices attached to a boom. A 20 foot boom mounted between
4 machines can serve all 4 machines.
• Vacuum or Magnetic Lifts: hoist long heavy sheets of material – skins of aircraft are
moved with vacuum lifts.
• Robots: can be used for loading, unloading, painting, welding, and material handling
tasks. They are useful in repetitive, and dangerous or hazardous tasks.
 Mobile Fabrication Equipment
• Slides and Chutes: Part slides down to the next operator by use of gravity.
Can be made of wood, plastic, or steel and can easily be moved.
• Skate Wheels and Roller Conveyors (Non powered): Come in 10 foot
sections and can be combined to make any length (fig 11-42, page 332).
• Lift Conveyors: Lift conveyors (sometimes called bucket conveyors) (fig 11-
43a, page 333) can move water, grain, coal, or anything where a lot of
volume is needed.
• Adjustable Angle Conveyors: These conveyors (fig 11-43b, page 333) can
be set up and easily reconfigured to meet a variety of manufacturing,
assembly, and bulk handling needs.
• Magnetic Conveyors: Magnetic conveyors can be used for lifting ferrous
parts and components cheaply and efficiently.
• Auger or Screw Conveyors: Grain and wood chips are moved this way.
• Vibratory Conveyors: Used in separation of parts such as sand or rocks.
 Conveyors
• Belt Conveyors: are endless loops of fabric that can be any width
and any length (fig 11-48, page 339).Belt material can be cloth or
rubber, and can run over sheet metal or rollers.
• Powered Roller Conveyors: Moving boxes over a fixed path for long
distances is a good use of a powered roller conveyor.
• Slat Conveyors: (fig 11-51, page 342) In drink bottling plants, bottles
or cans are carried through the filling, capping, and labeling
machines by slat conveyors made of thin 6x4 inch metal slats.
• Tow Conveyors: pull carts around a fixed path (fig 11-52, page 342,
343).
• Overhead Trolley Conveyors: can carry parts (fig 11-53, page 345,
346) through heat treating, washing, painting, and drying to the
assembly department.
 Packout
• Packout typically involves packaging a unit for shipment.
• Box Formers: Box forming can be accomplished automatically and
wrapped around the product being packaged (fig 11-55, page 347).
Soft drink bottling plants use box formers.
• Automatic Taping, Gluing, and Stapling: Closing boxes and sealing
them can be accomplished automatically (fig 11-56, page 348).
• Palletizers: Filled boxes are automatically stacked on a palletizer
and filled pallets are moved to a pickoff area where a truck moves
them to the warehouse (fig 11-57, page 348).
• Banding: is used when packages cannot hold themselves on pallets.
• Stretch Wrap: is like banding in that it holds packages together on a
pallet.
 Warehousing
• The functions of a warehouse are to pick customer orders and
prepare them for shipping.
• Picking Carts: Customer orders can be picked from shelves and
placed on picking carts (fig 11-61, page 352).
• Tractor-Trailer Picking Carts: When picking large orders, an order
picker would drive a tractor pulling many trailers (fig 11-63, page
354).
• Packing Station: Once orders are picked, they must be packed for
shipping. A weight scale built into the packaging station (fig 11-68,p
age 358) is very desirable.
• Shipping Containers: Most shipping containers are pallets, but
sometimes the may be the size of a tractor trailer. These containers
can be sealed by the shipper and not opened until received by
customer.
 Bulk Material Handling
• Bulk material means a large amount of material (coal,
paper, oil, grains).
• Troughed Belt Conveyors: The coal industry uses these
conveyors to move coal.
• Vacuum Delivery Systems: Used for moving pellets or
powders from tank cars to storage towers to equipment
(fig 11-71, page 361).
• Pumps and Tanks: Oil, liquids, and semi liquids are
moved from tankers to tanks to filling stations by pumps.
• Conveyor Systems: If your bulk products are cartons, a
system of conveyors may be used (fig 11-73, page 363).
 Computer Integrated Material
Handling Systems
• Material handling costs are a major component of
product cost, so they need to keep improving.
• Automated storage and retrieval systems (ASRS) is
made up of racks, shuttle cars, bridge cranes, computer
control center, and conveyor systems.
• Cross Docking and Flow Through: In such operations,
products or parts from different suppliers are moved
across the facility to the point of use, or in the case of a
distribution center, moved directly into a waiting truck for
dispatch to their ultimate destination. The benefits of
cross docking include reduced warehousing and
inventory costs.
 Summary
• The height of the plant floor off the driveway or rail bed should be 46 inches for trucks and 54 inches for boxcars.
• A trailer dock door is typically 9 x 9 foot roll up.
• Sometimes air curtains and plastic curtains are placed in doorways to minimize air loss from the plant.
• Systems Required on Receiving and Shipping Docks: 1. Part numbering systems that allow for identification of
inventory. 2. Purchase order system authorizing the receiving of material. 3. Customer order system authorizing
the shipment of material. 4. Bill of lading authorizing a trucking company to move material and to bill for their
services.
• Stores is the term used to describe the room where raw materials and supplies are held until they are needed.
The raw materials stores is usually the largest, but maintenance and office supplies stores can be large as well.
• Narrow aisle reach trucks are one of the better choices for maneuvering in storage areas.
• Locator System: Every location has an address and the warehouse person must know how to reach any address.
• Kitting System: Kitting is the process of pulling together the parts required for the next day’s production.
• Inventory Control System: Maintaining a proper level of inventory is the function of inventory control.
• Fabrication starts with raw material and ends with finished parts.
• Because they must be used over and over again, shop containers must be durable, stackable, and portable.
• Manipulators are specifically designed to perform lifting, rotating, tilting, turning, and positioning tasks that far
exceed human capability.
• Robots: can be used for loading, unloading, painting, welding, and material handling tasks. They are useful in
repetitive, and dangerous or hazardous tasks.
• Packout typically involves packaging a unit for shipment.
• The functions of a warehouse are to pick customer orders and prepare them for shipping.
• Material handling costs are a major component of product cost, so they need to keep improving.
 Home Work
1. What are the characteristics of shop
containers?
2. What jobs are robots most useful for?
3. Why do material handling systems need to
keep improving?