Flexible WMS from PSI for Black Forest screws

Safe is safe" is the guiding principle of Heco-Schrauben GmbH & Co. KG, based in Schramberg in the Black Forest. Founded in 1967, the family business produces around 1.5 billion screws per year. An ageing intralogistics system was increasingly proving to be a limitation for the company's continuous order and business growth. The company therefore decided to build a new logistics center to increase storage capacity and efficiency. "The logistics center is the logical response to the constantly growing demands on goods and materials management," says warehouse manager Torsten Hettich, explaining the decision. "This ranges from the system equipment to optimum process control through a flexible warehouse management system."

The new logistics center with high-bay warehouse (HBW), automated small parts warehouse (AS/RS) and a generously dimensioned picking and dispatch area has been in practical operation since the beginning of 2014. "5,000 pallet spaces, 50,000 carton spaces, state-of-the-art picking technology and fully automated processes offer extensive capacities and ensure significantly increased throughput," summarizes Hettich. "The most important processes in the warehouse are largely automated."

"New dialogs with project-specific input masks were set up in PSIwms for entering incoming goods."

Christian Welter Project Manager, PSI Logistics

High flexibility and investment security

Within nine months, PSIwms was tailored precisely to the requirements of the screw manufacturer's logistics center and implemented. Photo: PSI Logistics

The PSIwms warehouse management system from PSI Logistics forms the basic system for inventory management, coordination and process control. "With the software from PSI, we have a powerful WMS that offers us a high degree of flexibility and investment security and can be tailored to our requirements in terms of the range of functions and the required dialogs," says Hettich, explaining the decision to award the contract.

PSI Logistics supplied the radio data terminals required for process handling and installed the interfaces to the material flow computer and Heco's host system. In addition, the specific processes at HECO were incorporated into PSIwms with numerous individual programs. Within nine months, PSIwms was precisely tailored to the requirements of the screw manufacturer's logistics center and implemented. "The best solution in combination with the material flow control system of the plant supplier," says the warehouse manager.

Interaction of the systems

The stored goods are delivered by shuttle from the production building a few hundred meters away. Pallet conveyor technology transports the palletized screw cartons to the logistics center. After being recorded and received in the IT system, pallets are routed to the HBW. There, the stacker cranes store the pallets double-deep in one of the two storage aisles according to the specifications of the material flow computer (MFC). The MFR reports the storage location to PSIwms, which manages the stocks, retrievals and picking processes. "New dialogs with project-specific input masks were set up in PSIwms for entering incoming goods," explains Christian Welter, Project Manager at PSI Logistics.

To load the miniload, the WMS directs pallets from the high-bay warehouse to an automatic depalletizer as required. It takes over the separation. A conveyor line then takes the cartons to an automatic labeling system. There, the cartons are given an individual barcode label before they are transferred to the storage lanes for the three miniload aisles and stored in them. The PSIwms directs any remaining partial pallets back to the high-bay warehouse.

Tour-appropriate outsourcing

Heco-Schrauben's new logistics center has a generously dimensioned picking and dispatch area. Throughput has been significantly increased. Photo: Heco

Heco mainly supplies specialist stores from the new logistics center. Eight picking stations have been set up for order production. Both shipping cartons and shipping pallets can be packed with the source cartons at these stations. PSIwms coordinates the retrieval of the required cartons from the mini-load warehouse to the respective picking stations for freight forwarders and CEP service providers according to stored strategies. The picking processes are supported by a lighting system according to the pick-from/pick-to principle. PSIwms uses new dialog interfaces to show the pickers the source carton on a display and indicates the respective target container. Up to four target cartons can be picked at each picking station. In addition, each picking station has two target pallet spaces.

An outfeed conveyor takes the cartons to the packing station, where the shipping packages are sealed, labeled and transferred to the goods issue area. PSIwms uses a scale integrated into the conveyor line to check the correct order production by comparing the stored master data with the order data and the corresponding weights of the picked order items.

"An all-round successful solution," sums up warehouse manager Hettich with satisfaction. "PSIwms ensures efficient and highly secure logistics and order picking processes that enable us to meet current and future market challenges. An investment that is fully in line with our company's motto, 'safe is safe'."

Hartmut Braun