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The recent rise of private-label goods has led to increased competition within the FMCG industry. A focus on bringing high volume products at lower prices to the market has created greater demands on all actors. Producers must differentiate their products and quickly bring them to market. Since products are consumed shortly after they are produced, it is imperative to keep production uptime high at all times. Any stop in production can cause empty shelves and lost market share.
Current conveyor systems normally work within a range of 40 to 60m/min, and sometimes up to 80m/min with special solutions. FlexLink's new X85 conveyor system offers an upper speed limit of 120m/min.
As high speed capability makes products more sensitive to dents and damages, FlexLink's distributed line control allows high speed with dynamic speed control, giving soft starts and stops that enable gentle product handling. The dynamic speed control also allows dynamic buffering with an increased line throughput. Speed varies seamlessly up and down, balancing product flow between up- and downstream machines. This way, waiting time is minimised, wear is drastically reduced and power consumption is 30-60 per cent less than traditional conveyors. To put in other words, the installation is run in a gentle, controlled manner offering substantially increased MTBF (Mean Time Between Failures).
Requirements on higher delivery service and lower inventory levels requires smaller batch sizes, as well as easier and more frequent re-settings of manufacturing lines. Thus it requires that the conveyor system is easy to adjust for the different product sizes. FlexLink's AGS (Automatic Guiding System) communicates with the machines and automatically adjusts the width. This means resetting without manual interference and time loss, and payback times as short as 3-4 months.
When it comes to the working environment and handling equipment, the most apparent areas are noise level and operator safety. Many traditional conveyor systems still expose operators to substantial risks of injuries, and too high noise levels.
Noise from machines and equipment is one of the hottest issues in manufacturing environments today. Considerable efforts have been spent in reducing the noise level in conveyor systems and indeed, it is a complex system with a number of noise sources. With the new X85 conveyor, FlexLink is claiming a noise level of maximum 60dB(A) at reference speed.
FlexLink has put much emphasis in developing installations that are safe, yet efficient. An example is the wheel bends that have a closed design without pinch points, but are still very flexible and provide easy and gentle transport through tight bends. Additionally, an overlapping chain with no horizontal openings is provided.
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FlexLink AB is based in Göteborg, Sweden. www.flexlink.com