Material Handling Cart delivery is the fastest growing trend in the material handling industry and will grow more than 10 percent year over year (YoY) for the next five years. The primary factors driving this growth rests with the fact that cart delivery serves as a safer and more productive alternative to a fork truck saturated material flow.
There are many added benefits when implementing material handling cart delivery moving towards a fork truck free environment. Products must meet the metrics of takt times and productivity while simultaneously remaining defect-free.
The implementation of lean principles allows manufacturers the ability to remove wasteful processes; manufacturing including lineside delivery is a strong instigator of cart delivery solutions. Manufacturers recognize refining processes affecting the assembly line is no longer optional, but rather the next step in best-practice process improvement.
From raw materials replenishment to work in process transport, cart delivery is integral in efficiently accomplishing finished goods removal as well as lineside deliveries pulled from a variety of outlets depending on the material flow of the operation.
Cart delivery is particularly valuable in kitting, the process of grouping component parts together for delivery to the line-side without the need to assemble them. It is the packaging of components to create a new parent with no assembly required. Sequencing is important to the kitting process when kits consist of sequenced parts, which are non-common parts with unique characteristics distinguished by the model, size, or color of the end item in which they are to be included. Kits are assembled onto kit carts that are often specifically-engineered for the kits they will deliver. Customized kitting processes help streamline manufacturing and assembly activities, resulting in cost savings from reduced material handling, space requirements, and congestion with ease-of-use at the point of consumption. Topper Industrial is known as the industry leader by carefully engineering line-side storage locations, storage volumes, parts presentation, and delivery methods.
Each cart is designed and built for specific material handling methods to minimize travel time and increase material flow while reducing traffic, congestion, and improving safety.
Cart delivery optimizes the flow path and material delivery routes to make picking simple. Parts are location-coded and stored-based on usage and in picking order while locations are designated for shortest delivery to the line. Standard parts that are used in all end items are separated from specific parts (model/size/color), and similar parts for different end items are stored in separate locations.
Topper Industrial works closely with the lean consultants to design and create unique material handling equipment per application that encourages the implementation of “lean material flow” techniques. The primary waste reduction opportunity lies in reduction of size of the operation’s forklift fleet and the scope of a planned conveyor system, in favor of other tools carrying materials at designated intervals on repetitive paths to production.
While the fork truck is not going to vanish any time soon, the rapid growth of cart delivery rests in the operational awareness that the forklift and pallet model is a poor fit to the repeatable flow of items between the same locations. Pushcarts or trains of two (or more) carts traveling on fixed routes at fixed intervals, like a subway system, can predictably, efficiently, and effectively pick up and drop off quantities of materials that are usually less than full pallet loads, provide a less expensive, more reliable, and more predictive system with quantifiable bottom-line impacts.
Contact sales@topperindustrial.com if you need steel containers for your material handling needs.
Topper Industrial is capable of creating custom Delivery Carts for your unique material handling needs.
Topper Industrial (www.topperindustrial.com) has a great team of people working hard each day to create the most reliable and innovative material handling products for our customers. Combined with over 40 years of experience in the material handling industry, Topper’s team of highly skilled engineers, designers and skilled workers is especially equipped to design and build Industrial Carts (Mother / Daughter Cart Systems, Quad Steer Carts or Tracking Carts, Specialized Delivery Carts, Transfer Carts with Roller Deck, Static Carts, Rotation Carts, Tilt Carts or Kitting Carts), Industrial Cart Components (Cart Parts Department), Industrial Containers (Corrugated Containers), Pallets, Lift/Tilt Systems, and Racking. Topper is very proud of the dedication each and every team member has for developing quality products for ever changing needs across the supply chain.
Topper’s team is eager to help create solutions for every customer’s material flow requirements. All customers quickly become part of the extended Topper family. Contact us today at sales@topperindustrial.com.
“Keeping your material in motion.”