When Invensys Controls Europe made the decision to invest in a new storage solution in their Plymouth based manufacturing plant and warehouse facility they selected from three leading providers. Al Briggs, Manufacturing Engineering Manager for the Plymouth site awarded the contract to LINPAC Storage Systems, he comments, "LINPAC provided us with the best service. They responded quickly to our brief and designed an innovative solution which has increased the efficiency of our warehouse."
The facility, which stores over 3500 different component part numbers and more than 1700 different product lines of finished goods, originally had pallet racking in half of the floor area and a mezzanine floor. The design brief was to start afresh, maximising the space utilisation and including special features to speed up the picking operation.
LINPAC's solution features full height adjustable pallet racking so that up to 2,000 pallets of Invensys raw material and finished goods can now be stored on five levels. Raw materials required to manufacture a particular product are batched together in aisles to save time.
Mesh decking has been installed to increase the versatility of the pallet racking allowing different sized pallets, totes or cardboard boxes to be stored easily. Heavy metal parts are stored on special 2.5 tonne racking along one side of the warehouse.
There is now a central picking aisle which combines pallet racking in the top four bays and carton live shelving at pick height. Small items are stored in the carton live which presents the finished goods to the picker in an easily accessible manner, constantly replenishing the pick face. Mixed product customer orders can be picked quickly whilst minimising travel around the warehouse.
Al Briggs concludes, "LINPAC Storage Systems turned around the storage project quickly for us – beating the original time frames. Our new storage solution has not only enabled us to increase our storage capacity it has also given us an advantage in terms of time saving."
Invensys Controls Europe, is a leading global provider of components, systems and services used in the heating, air conditioning/cooling, refrigeration, safety and appliance industries.
Invensys Controls Europe (ICE) is a leading provider of components, systems and product solutions for the appliance, climate and safety control markets through its key brands of Drayton, Eliwell, Ranco, Eberle and Firex .
ICE is the European arm of Invensys Controls, an organisation with operations in America and Asia providing components for domestic appliances and systems for controlling, measuring and monitoring heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) worldwide. With ten manufacturing plants across Europe and 43 manufacturing plants worldwide the company has more than 16,000 employees, it is a market leader for commercial refrigeration in Europe as well as a leading player in domestic heating and air conditioning markets
Invensys Controls, a division of Invensys, a worldwide automation, controls and process solutions group that has over 30,000 employees operating in 60 countries is listed on the London stock exchange. For more information please visit www.invensys.com
For customer service enquiries please phone: 0845 130 5522 or fax: 0845 130 0622