1.

Customer issue

Poclain is an industrial company that manufactures hydraulic radial piston motors for large constructions and agricultural handling equipment. The engine line assembles many references and the parts are delivered at the edge of the line in a 1200 x 800 pallet box. To avoid taking up too much space, only one box per reference is made available. This generates meetings between logistics and operators and therefore they have to wait for one another. In addition, forklifts require a 3.5m aisle.

The parts are all over 15 kg and are handled by hoists.

2.

Labadis Analysis

To answer the customer’s issue / problematic, we had to find a way to bring all the parts in as little space as possible.

We studied the shape of the parts and their assembly sequence to overlap them and maintain access to the hoist gripping equipment.

The analysis showed that the solution had to meet the following constraints:

•  Accessibility of parts by a hoist
• Compactness of the packaging
• Parts protection against scratches
• Stability

3.

Solution provided

Labadis has designed a 400 mm wide kitting trolley, capable of transporting 120 kg of parts and also stable in a small train.

In order to have only one model of trolley, Labadis studied the bearing faces of all the parts needed to build these different motors and designed a versatile support.

The parts are arranged one above the other and are all accessible by the hoist thanks to hollow supports.

Impacts and scratches on the pieces are avoided thanks to the choice in the design.

Therefore Poclain was able to eliminate waiting times, compact the line edge and reduce the aisles.

1.

Customer situation

• Production lines are often down because of missing parts linked to the delivery lead time from warehouse
• High rack storages require fork lift and specific equipment that are expensive, dangerous and not efficient
• Storage height doesn’t allow a visual management of the stock

2.

Labadis diagnostic

• Warehouse picking lead time is higher than the assembly lines requested lead time. To be able to supply parts on time, warehouse anticipates the request and creates a sub storage on the floor.
• Packaging filling rate is low, even if all locations are occupied, warehouse contains a lot of empty volumes
• Space between two pallet racks is twice the width of the pallet rack itself
• Repacking is done all along the production flow with small quantities

3.

Labadis solution

• Direct access to all parts from the ground without any lifting device = flat storage
• Use the same packaging to feed the line and stock in the warehouse
• Repack all parts in the correct packaging before storing them
• Depending on the quantity to stock, create 3 to 4 areas designed in terms of storage type (gravity racks, trolleys) and length

1.

Customer situation

Virax Epernay design, produce and supply tools for plumbers and hose assembly. The plant has a wide type of process and a high technical expertise. Today Virax wishes to reduce their stocks of outstanding and finished products in order to improve their service rate. To do this, they have to reduce the size of the production batch with the same variety of products.

2.

Labadis diagnostic

On the production line, we have analyzed all steps of a product assembly. For each step, we have observed and measured problems from waste:

• Operator produces batch of parts = take, release, take, …
• Assembly line is in an L shape, a big space is wasted in the middle
• Working stations are at least 3 times wider than the product
• Outsourced parts packaging is not compatible with the side line feeding
• Vertical shelves increase the grip height
• Packaging size increases the movement of the operator and wastes space all along the transfer

3.

Implemented solution

In order to increase Virax productivity, we have worked on 3 steps:

• Size reduction for packaging, workstation, tools
• One piece flow production and productivity thanks to space removed between workstation
• Use of offset Dynamics Rack to compact the station
• U shaped line design