The Problem:

High volume and high speed production necessitates accurate and immediate pallet identification in order to effectively manage product movement though-out the shop. A major manufacturer of glassware needed to be able to serialize and uniquely identify all of the pallets of "ware" with distinctive load tags for six separate departments. Shop floor personnel were required to enter their requests for these tags using a system that did not allow any validation of operator entries. Therefore, numerous typographical errors occurred resulting in misidentified products. Personnel also pre-printed and stored load tags resulting in lost tags, mis-placed tags, and ultimately mis-labeled product.

  The Solution:

Each department has an Intermec 3400 printer and an Intermec 1800 wedge scanner attached to a PC. The load tag system is fully integrated with the ASI business system and Cape systems pallet organization package. Shop floor personnel now scan the work order number from the production worksheet into the PC. The system validates the work order number entered and displays all known information for the load tag. The operator will then edit any of the displayed information and enter the desired number of load tags. Once the operator has finished, the system will automatically determine the quantity on the pallet and assign a unique serial number for each load tag to be printed. All information associated with this pallet is stored on the load tag system. The operator then places the load tags on each pallet before it is moved from the area. Material handlers need only scan the serial number of the load tag in order for the system to record all movement information.

  The Benefits:

With an automated load tag system all information is now validated to the source order on the host application. Since the load tag system generates the serial numbers for the tags, duplicates are no longer possible. Therefore, load tag information is accurate and correctly identifies the material on the pallet. Each department has their own unique identification tag, allowing shop floor personnel to easily identify which stage of production the pallet of material has been through. All information pertaining to each pallet is recorded in a centrally located database, which permits easy access by anyone with a connection to the network. In addition, the Pallet organization system is now integrated with the load tag system resulting in standardized pallet quantities, eliminating the guesswork of inventory on hand.