When The Whitehall Group, a division of Cadmus Communications, built a new 125,000 square foot warehouse next to a printing plant, a system of three laser-guided AGVs (AGV Products, 704-845-1110) was the natural solution to link the two facilities together.

"There's not a lot of value add in having employees transport materials back and forth between the two buildings on a lift truck," says Jay Gibble, vice president of manufacturing for the Charlotte, N.C. provider of specialty packaging and printing solutions to industry. "The AGVs allowed us to create an efficient, safe working environment without adding people."

Working with Jeremy Carnes, the warehouse and fulfillment center manager, Gibble and the operations team settled on a 300-foot-long tunnel serviced by three laser-guided, pallet-handling AGVs equipped with forks. The process begins when an AGV delivers a pallet of raw materials from the receiving area in the fulfillment center to one of eight staging areas for the printing presses.

If the vehicle senses that the drop- off lane is already full, it automatically moves to the next open lane.

Once the AGV has delivered a load of raw materials, it signals that it is available for a pick up. If a load is ready, the vehicle travels to one of three pick-up lanes by the stretchwrapper. If no load is available, the unit is directed to an automatic battery charging station.

In addition to providing efficient pick up and delivery of materials, the system is very flexible. "After we had worked with the system, we set up several miscellaneous pick-up and drop-off lanes for items we were still moving with lift trucks," Gibble says. "It was a very simple modification to the traffic flow and programming."

According to Gibble, the printer has met both of the original objectives for the system. "There's no question that we have a safer environment, and that our operations are more effective as a result," he says.