The customer's car-making manufacturing plant has two departments: in one, the containers are filled with products, and in the other, they are emptied by forklifts. The large scale of production made it important for the company to know at any given time where empty or full containers were located — otherwise the productivity of some department was decreased.
The movement of containers was tracked manually: operators and pickers had to fill out paperwork when containers arrived at the department. In order to have full control over the process, the customer planned to automate the work of the departments, for which it was decided to turn to the experts of ICL Services.Key Challenges
The aim of the project is to implement a system for monitoring and accounting of containers via RFID technology. This required:
developing a container monitoring system;
equiping containers with RFID tags and forklift trucks with readers;
developing an interface for providing data in the form of a web-service, providing data from RFID-system to generate operational information on the movement of containers;
transmitting data from the RFID system to the internal reporting service via API (reporting service used by the customer and maintained in-house).
Implemented our solution
At the start of the project, ICL Services specialists collected and analyzed the client's requirements for the tracking system, created a work schedule, and tested the equipment that was planned to be connected.
Implementation of the system at the customer site had several stages.
Software Development
Special software was developed to track the movement of containers around the customer's plant. The software allows to determine when containers enter and leave the department, as well as to see where the empty containers are located at the moment.
Equipping containers with RFID tags
Specialists placed RFID tags on every container and gate in the departments. This tag contains an identification number that is assigned to a specific container and a specific gate.
Information about the container location goes into the customer's information system — so you can determine when a particular container has passed through the gate.
A total of 1,000 RFID tags were purchased for the project: about 750 were placed on containers and gates, and 250 were kept in reserve.
Mounting the readers
Two types of readers were used for the project: manual and automatic.
Manual readers are located in the departments and are used by the operator while packing or unloading of containers. This is how the system learns about the final points of tare movement.
Automatic readers were placed on eight forklifts, which moved around the department with the containers. When the forklift passes the gate, the reader scans two tags at the same time: on the container and on the gate. By doing this, it understands that the tare passes through a particular gate and changes the status of that tare in the system.
The container status can be monitored not only by specialists in the department, but also by forklift operators involved in the process of moving containers. Using the forklift's tablet, they can access the system's web interface and view the current status and locations of the containers. The tablets are also used to distribute Wi-Fi to RFID forklift-mounted readers.
However, the departments had an unstable Internet connection, so ICL Services specialists had to solve the communication issue via a reliable VPN.
Products and technologies
- Track&Trace RFID system at ACP
Results
- The customer received a system that allows him to track the movement and location of containers in the departments. With this data, the company can better control the productivity of the departments — how much they can deliver or ship at any given time.
- ICL Services specialists have also prepared a detailed manual, which the customer's employees can always refer to in case of any future difficulties.
- The implemented pilot project is easy to scale, and the monitoring system can be set up not only between two departments, but also to move around the entire enterprise and different types of products. In addition, this solution can be integrated with other solutions at the site — for example, with a security system or analytics system.
- With further development of the project, the customer can significantly speed up the inventory of products.