How Do You Make the Most of Your Material Handling Equipment?

Material handling equipment is the backbone of any logistics operation and warehouse. While an efficient material handling system can bring about a lot of benefits to the overall operation, a lousy material handling system can negatively affect the operation in terms of delivery times, accidents, and expenditure. Therefore, it’s important to have a successful material handling system in place.

In this article, we will discuss the ways to make the most of your material handling equipment.

Having the right tools for the job

This is the first step to making the most out of your material handling system. A warehouse or factory might have a large fleet of handling equipment, but having the right tools for each job is important. It is necessary to understand all the options of devices available for the task at hand.

For example, when a particular process needs objects to be lifted vertically making the load weightless, someone without the requisite knowledge might install an air balancer. But the right tool for the job would be an inline vertical lifter such as the Conco AirLift Inline Vertical Lifter. This would result in cost-savings and the right tool would do the job better.

Organizing your facility intelligently

This is a fundamental criterion for having an effective material handling system. Organizing your facility entails several things. The first one is to have a streamlined layout; a layout that supports your operation and the equipment in hand. For example, if you have a building with high ceilings, you could invest in overhead material handling equipment. This way, you can make the most out of the available floor space.

The other aspect is to invest in automation wisely. Automation is highly effective but it’s not necessarily the right solution for every situation. It is important to analyze the processes where automation would be ideal and the ones that require workers to add value to goods by processing them.

Being up-to-date with maintenance

No matter what kind of material handling equipment you use, regular maintenance of your equipment is necessary. This way, you can avoid breakdowns, repairs, and downtime. It is more economical to keep your machinery in good condition by taking preventative measures than spending large amounts of money on expensive repairs. Having a regular maintenance schedule and assigned employees for maintenance is a good way to do that.

Optimizing and documenting equipment

Documenting and maintaining data pertaining to your material handling equipment is a good way to make the best use of it. The information that should be available include data on the hours of use, the change of operators, and the load details for all equipment. This is how you can have a good idea of the cost per hour, the efficiency of equipment, and service requirements. You also get a clear picture of the operator training needs for your warehouse operations.

By having well-defined processes for material handling and following the above-mentioned tips, you can make the most out of your material handling equipment.