Challenges:
Solution: 87" Yellow Jacket 110 Orbital Lock-Down Stretch Wrap machine
|
National Tube Form Inc. prepares daily palleted goods shipments four times faster with Yellow Jacket 110® orbital stretch wrap equipment.Since National Tube Form Inc. (Fort Wayne, Ind.) began “orbital” machine-wrapping its palletized loads for shipment, the company has cut its time spent readying loads for shipment by more than 300 percent. Besides increasing productivity in other areas and saving money, the switch from manually wrapping and banding loads to pallets has resulted in happier employees and customers. NTF is a family-owned, full-service tube and pipe assembly manufacturer. NTF’s operations are quite diverse. It manufactures its tube and pipe assemblies from steel, stainless steel, brass, copper, aluminum, alloy steel, Inconel and Hastalloy and offers round, square and rectangular parts, either hollow or solid. NTF customizes parts via a variety of services, like beading, dimpling, flaring, notching, painting, plating, polishing, tapering, threading, and several others.
NTF distributes it products to more than 300 customers worldwide in a variety of industries, including automotive, construction, locomotive, marine, aircraft, lawn and garden, and defense, to name a few. NTF’s 108,000-square-foot facility employs more than 100 people who perform all phases of the manufacturing process in-house, from tool making to the finished product. Once the product is finished, it needs to be shipped. NTF ships an estimated 10,000 tube assemblies per day. To improve efficiency in this area of its business, NTF recently purchased a manual 87” Yellow Jacket 110® Orbital Lock-Down Stretch Wrap machine from Yellow Jacket LLP (Marion, Ind.) According to Tracie Yarian, Shipping/ Receiving and Warehouse Supervisor at NTF, one of NTF’s owners first saw the Yellow Jacket 110 in action at a trade show and arranged to have one sent to her facility for a trial. After about two loads, Yarian said, “We want this.” Because its customers often order parts of several sizes and shapes, NTF employees assemble loads through a pick-and-pack method. According to Yarian, 90 percent of NTF’s shipments are palletized. All tube and pipe assemblies are boxed to prevent damage and are placed on pallets with lengths varying from 48” to 72”. Many of the boxes are quite lengthy depending on the size of the part and some are odd-shaped because NTF often bends tubes into odd shapes.
Different load configurations handled by one stretch-wrap machine NTF categorizes its loads into three classifications. An “A” load fits perfectly onto a pallet (with the same box sizes) and typically stands about four feet high. A “B” load is more odd-shaped because of various box sizes and must be adjusted in order to be tied down. A “C” load is even more odd-shaped than a B load and “wastes a lot of space because of potential air pockets,” Yarian said. The Yellow Jacket 110 secures each type of load to its pallet equally well. The Yellow Jacket 110 machine wraps pallet sizes of 52” square and 5’ long at speeds up to 30 revolutions per minute. It offers a small overall footprint and open overhang of 72” x 100” and 105”, respectively. The wrapping process begins by placing a roll of stretch wrap on the machine’s spool. Then, a forklift driver positions the palletized load inside the machine’s cylinder, which is open on both sides. Leaving the pallet on the forklift, the driver then ties the stretch wrap to the bottom of the pallet. The machine is then started with the push of a button. The spool “orbits” the load on a track, applying stretch wrap from under the pallet to the boxes above. This helps to better “lock down” the load to the pallet. An employee manually maneuvers the cylinder horizontally to ensure that the load is completely wrapped and secured to the pallet. Once that is achieved, the stretch wrap is cut and the forklift removes the wrapped load. Most loads are wrapped in under a minute.
Yellow Jacket’s orbital lock-down technology secures loads so well that it eliminates the need for banding. This eliminates one step for NTF, but also erases one inconvenience for customers. They can more easily access their cargo by making just one cut of the stretch wrap instead of having to cut several metal or plastic bands. “The customers seem to like it (the way their goods are shipped),” Yarian said. “We’re getting a lot of good feedback from it.” NTF’s customers can also feel confident that they’re shipments will arrive without incurring any damage because the lock-down technology ensures that loads will not shift during transport. The Yellow Jacket Payoff According to Yarian, Wednesday is generally NTF’s busiest shipping day, when the company ships around 50 pallets. When employees manually skidded, banded and wrapped loads, it would take one employee at least four hours to prepare 50 pallets for shipping. Since implementing the Yellow Jacket 110, preparation of the same number of loads takes about an hour.
“With these figures, I think we can achieve a payoff of the equipment—both in labor savings and reduced shipping claims on damaged goods—in well under a year,” Yarian said. Another easily noticed benefit to the Yellow Jacket 110 that NTF employees experienced is its ease-of-use. Since it is designed for use by either technical or non-technical personnel, training time is minimized, usually to within an hour. Employees were eager to learn how to use the Yellow Jacket 110, not only because of its efficiency, but also because it eliminates any physical wear and tear caused by manually preparing pallets. She also appreciated the fact that it can plug into any 110-volt outlet and can easily be maintained with standard, off-the-shelf replacement parts. “Hand-wrapping strained a lot of backs,” Yarian said. “The payoff of having the Yellow Jacket 110 measures beyond money when you think of keeping workers healthy and happy as part of the mix.” Learn how the Yellow Jacket 110® might improve your operations…send us an email—or pick up the phone and call us at 800-387-5001. |
|||||
|
