The future of picking, part 2: The Holy Grail of piece picking
Some forward-thinking end users have completely automated pallet and carton picking. Is piece picking next?
By Bob Trebilcock, Executive Editor -- Modern Materials Handling, 5/13/2009
Want to know what the future of automated piece picking might look like? If so, you might want to go to a library and read a book, says Jeff Hedges, director of business development for HK Systems. Or, at least pick a book.
“The challenge to automated piece picking is getting items from inside a box at point A into another container at point B,” says Hedges. “Once you see those types of automated solutions, we’ll have the final answer to a true lights out warehouse.”
Lights out automation is now the Holy Grail of warehouse distribution. The idea is that product is received at one end of the facility and shipped out at the other end with no human intervention in between. You could turn the lights out and still run the joint.
When it comes to pallet and carton handling, we may not be there yet, but we’re getting close. Crossdocking pre-allocated cartons or pallets, for instance, is a highly automated process. Last year, we described how Chrysler and one of its suppliers automated the delivery of instrument panels from the end of the line in the parts manufacturing plant right up to the point where they were installed in an automobile on the Chrysler assembly line. And, in the May issue of Modern, we explain how Kroger’s grocery warehouses in Arizona and Colorado automatically receive and store full pallets, de-palletize cases and then rebuild mixed pallets according to an aisle in a store.
In fact, automatically building mixed cases pallets was once considered the Holy Grail. “Today, there truly are lights out facilities for pallet and case handling,” says Hedges. “Clients are now asking whether there’s an ability to automatically pick individual items.”
As Chrysler has demonstrated, the answer is yes, especially if you have a manufacturing company making a limited number of products. “If you’re making cylinders, you can have a robot pick them up, stack them in a tray, and ship them out,” says Hedges. “The challenge is creating a system that will do that if you have the variety of items to pick that you’ll find in a retail distribution center.”
As a result, much of the focus today has been on making the manual worker as effective as possible. In goods-to-person picking, for instance (look for the June issue of Modern), individual items are stored in totes in a carousel or mini-load system and automatically delivered to a workstation. However, those solutions still require an associate to pick the pieces from the tote and place them in a shipping container.
What’s all of this got to do with libraries? Over the years, HK has done a lot of work adapting automated materials handling technology, like automated storage and retrieval (AS/RS), for the library industry. But those libraries still rely on people to put books back on the shelf – in essence, to do the picking. Some libraries are trying to solve that problem. “Right now, we know of libraries that are experimenting with a robot that would have free access to the library,” says Hedges. “The robot can go to the correct floor, aisle and the correct shelf for where the book is located.”
The robot is still challenged by handling books of differing sizes, says Hedges, but they’re working on it. And at another library, researchers have developed a robot that can turn individual pages so that the book can be scanned and digitized. The sophistication involved in turning pages might be able to be adapted to picking items from a bin. “Think about the accuracy and very fine definition required for those end effectors,” says Hedges.
How far off is that kind of solution? Today, they are still science projects. “Is it five years off? I don’t know,” says Hedges. “But it’s clearly where the technology is headed, and as the availability of labor continues to be an issue, I think you’ll see more interest from industrial users.”
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