Marposs is a leading company in the supply of precision instruments for measurement and control in the production environment: meters and compensation systems for grinding, tools and sensors, components hardware and software for data collection and process analysis.
In its plant in Bentivoglio there are as many as 14 Modula in the production area and 10 in the warehouse/shipping area.
Marposs supplies, on the global market, a variety of customers who require high product customization which, by its nature, also has considerable technical complexity.
A typical order from a Marposs customer is therefore extremely articulated, complex and heterogeneous. Hence the need to manage a large number of codes, often similar to each other, and avoid any picking error.
For this reason, the preparation area was equipped with a battery of 10 Modula modules capable of managing more than 16,000 codes. From here the withdrawals of the goods that must be prepared for each order are made. It has been joined by an evolved Put to Light system which allows the process to be speeded up and made more efficient by practically reducing errors to zero.
How does order picking work with Modula automatic vertical warehouses?
The goods are stored in the 10 Modula warehouses. When preparing the orders, the operators carry out the withdrawals of the requested goods which can also be found in different warehouses. By typing the request for the required piece on the touch screen, the Modula drawer is presented at eye level in the appropriate bay and a Laser Pointer system indicates the exact piece to be picked with a green and a red light.
The operator prepares a box in which he affixes a barcode belonging to the order. The box with the material already available is moved by a belt which takes it directly to the preparation area equipped with the Put to Light. By reading only the barcode of the box, the operator sees a compartment of the shelf light up and, right in the lighted space, places the box taken from the belt.
The operation will also perform the same process with other boxes, with different contents. When an order is complete (this is detected by reading the various codes) the cell lights up, this time green, and this is the signal that the order can be sent to another department. The operator therefore picks up the material in the cell, checks it piece by piece again, comparing it with the images and codes that are proposed to the PC, and packs it and prepares it for the next station.
The combination of these 2 systems: automatic warehouses and Put to Light, developed by Modula in collaboration with the customer, allows you to work with extreme precision. In this way, the percentage of errors is reduced to almost zero and highly complex orders can be managed, usually subject to constant revisions.
The advantage is not only in terms of efficiency for Marposs but also in terms of satisfaction for its end customer who receives the goods in a single delivery in record time.
Marposs also chose to install a Modula HC horizontal carousel
This choice was made to exploit unused space due to height problems. The Modula HC consists of three bays, a conveyor belt, a put to light system and a sorting area.