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Automatic warehouses for fabrics: warehouse streamlining processes reach India, at one of the greatest textile companies in the country.

Problem
Before Automha, storage was completely manual and on the ground, resulting in a waste of time and space, as well as many mistakes due to the dimensions and weight of the items – fabric rolls weighing up to 80 kg.

The goal was to completely rearrange the warehouse’s operations through an automated logistics process – from registration of parcels to production, storage, picking and shipping – all run by a computerized system.

Solution
Automha has designed a large 4,000 square meter facility (1,115 meters long and 14.5 meters wide, with a height of 13 meters), able to collect a total of 18,400 cloth rolls of two different sizes (1,5m long weighing 40 kilograms; 3m long weighing 80 kilograms).
The 5-level warehouse has a cantilever rack designed and built specifically for the unique needs of our client.

Two types of textile items arrive to this automatic warehouse: the batches of finished fabric coming from the finishing & quality control areas, and the semi-finished products, AKA “grey” because the fabric is not dyed or embroidered yet and comes from external suppliers or inner production frames.

We dedicated 15% of the storage space to these products, as well as an exclusive entrance bay, located near the rear of the plant.

Once the packages reach the warehouse, they are placed on a loading conveyor: here a series of operations are performed, such as length recognition; the reading of the barcode, usually placed at the head of the roller, with a 360-reader; weight control and, finally, transfer to the 5-level storage area. There, the batch will be withdrawn by one of the two stacker cranes and placed in the position determined by the system.

By reading the code, the information system registers the package and makes it available for sale. In the output phase, the missions begin with the receiving of orders. Then the system performs the automatic picking of the requested batches and sends them to the output bays, where the packages are picked by operators and transported to the shipping department.

The flow of information is managed by the AWM Automatic Warehouse Manager software developed by Automha, a platform able to communicate with the host company and designed to make optimal use of the plant’s performance and potential.

Advantages
The system designed by Automha optimizes all available space and improves the storage and picking operations. What is most significant is the level of precision obtained with the Automha software, able to halve the storage process’s margin of error.