DC Velocity - July 2009

inbound

how green is my VLM?

If you’ve been making a pitch for a new material handling system for your warehouse or DC, chances are you’ve fielded a few questions from management about its energy requirements and costs. But how do you figure out how much energy your proposed system would consume?

HK Systems says its new energy calculator can help. The company, which sells automated material handling systems and software, is offering a free Excel-based tool for estimating the amount of energy used by different types of equipment. The calculator also can compare energy consumption and costs for two scenarios at a time. It includes step-by-step instructions for determining the energy usage and costs for equipment in dozens of material handling categories, including vertical lift machines (VLMs), automated storage and retrieval systems, pallet and case conveyors, sortation systems, automated guided vehicles (AGVs), fork trucks and similar vehicles, picking and palletizing, lifts, and building services such as lighting, HVAC, and refrigeration.

To learn more about the calculator, go to HK Systems’ Web site ( www.hksystems.com) and download a copy of “Lean, green supply chains: An ener-gy-consumption calculator for material handling equipment.” The bulletin provides step-by-step instructions for using the calculator and shows sample reports. The calculator itself can be found at www.hksys-tems.com/calculators. ;

two for the show

Whether it’s a sign of the economic times or of closer collaboration among links in the supply chain, the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP) and the Association for Manufacturing Excellence (AME) have announced a new partnership. Members of each organization will receive a 10-percent discount when they join the other association. (Both memberships must be purchased at the same time for the discount to apply.) The alliance offers expanded professional education opportunities to members of both organizations, allowing AME members to learn more about logistics and supply chain management and CSCMP members to become more familiar with “lean” concepts and practices.

The relationship between CSCMP and AME will go much further than membership pricing, though. AME will host a track called “Manufacturing: Lean Ideas and Tools That Can Help Reshape Your Business” at CSCMP’s Annual Global Conference in Chicago, Sept. 20–23. Meanwhile, Dr. Thomas Speh, former chair of CSCMP’s board of directors, is developing a supply chain track for AME’s annual International Lean Conference, to be held Oct. 19–23 in Covington, Ky.

For more information, go to cscmp.org or www.ame.org.

;

RFID at the races

Twenty thousand runners pounding the pavement for more than 26 miles. How do you keep track of all of them? Officials of the Los Angeles Marathon rely on RFID tags and readers. Event organizers first tested the technology in 2008 and were so pleased with the results that they used it again in late May for the 2009 road race.

Each of the registered runners attached RFID-enabled timing tags from Chrono Track Systems to his or her shoelaces. The tags, which incorporate UPM Raflatac RFID tags and Impinj tag chips, recorded times at the start, at the finish, and at milestones along the race route. According to UPM Raflatac, attaching the disposable plas-tic-enclosed tags to the runners’ shoes ensures consistent he Los Angeles runners pass over urethane ramps that use UHF antennas to transmit race data to readers. Custom-designed controllers then format the collected data for use by scoring software. The system logged accurate data for 99. 84 percent of the runners in 2008.