"S-Bahn" for loading units: the transport bridge spans 80 meters - here part of the route towards production. © Westfalia

The software that optimally controls the conveyor and warehouse technology also contributes to this. With the Savanna-Net warehouse execution system, Westfalia is integrating its own solution that combines all functions for warehouse management and material flow control. In a single instance, on an intuitive user interface. This also avoids additional maintenance work due to fewer interfaces compared to individual software for warehouse management and warehouse controlling. The modular system is scalable to any level of complexity and creates complete data transparency for optimum warehouse management. In this case, it is connected to the GUS ERP system.

The satellite technology enables particularly deep storage channels and a high storage density. The LAM detaches itself from the storage and retrieval machine, drives underneath the load units in the storage channels and stores and retrieves them there. The pallets are set down on three parallel profiles to provide optimum support for the load units.

For flexible load carriers and heavy loads

The lifting satellites are designed for particularly heavy loads. The SRMs can handle 49 pallets per hour in a single cycle and 55 pallets per hour in a double cycle (combined storage and retrieval). Goods are stored on 10 levels on Euro pallets, industrial pallets, plastic pallets, one-way pallets with a minimum runner width of 100 millimetres, special formats and big bags. The load units usually weigh 250 to 350 kilograms. However, racks and systems are also designed for heavy load units weighing 900 to 1,250 kilograms. High-bay level 5 is reserved for these heaviest units.

"One particular requirement was to connect the existing production facility and the new high-bay warehouse with a new conveyor bridge built on site," says Frank Ratert. "We solved this with a transverse transfer car (QVW) from our own production. This transports load units at a speed of up to 200 meters per minute over 80 meters between production, warehouse and dispatch or factory outlet. The conveyor bridge spans between the factory and warehouse over the truck bypass of the high-bay warehouse."

On the production side, load units are loaded or picked up for production supply - still manually, in future by automated guided vehicles (AGVs). A vertical conveyor with a roller conveyor transports the load units between the floor and the platform to the conveyor bridge, where they are transferred or picked up from the transverse transfer car.

With a capacity of around 80 load units per hour, this QVW has many tasks to master. Ratert: "It transports load units from the dispatch zone and laboratories into the system, brings fresh goods and pallets to dispatch, takes over the acceptance and supply of the high-bay warehouse and supplies production with raw materials."

At the level of the conveyor bridge, the load units are distributed or removed from the QVW to the storage and retrieval machines via conveyor technology that runs on a conveyor technology platform in the high-bay warehouse. The dispatch area and the laboratories for external raw materials, such as gluten, are also connected to the conveyor bridge via a tunnel. Two vertical conveyors with roller conveyors and roller chain accumulation conveyors supply the QVW of the conveyor bridge or take the load units from it. The raw materials are checked in the laboratory on delivery and can then be transported directly to production or temporarily stored in the high-bay warehouse.

More space and sustainability

"The implementation of an automated high-bay warehouse has significantly increased our storage capacity and at the same time created space for new production facilities," emphasizes Maximilian Seeburger, Assistant to the Management Board. "The high-bay warehouse is a first step towards modernizing our shipping processes. It also offers us many opportunities to improve our material flows. The warehouse that has been freed up gives us the opportunity to expand our production in direct proximity to the existing facilities. This saves us a lot of peripheral and organizational effort that we would have had with a 'Plant 2'. In addition, the new high-bay warehouse will also be used as a central warehouse for the Alb-Gold Group in the future."

The Westfalia system is also an important step in the company's development in terms of sustainability, says Seeburger: "The storage system is equipped with energy-efficient technologies to minimize energy consumption. The roof of the new building has already been fitted with a photovoltaic system. Thanks to the improved warehouse organization and automated processes, we are also reducing waste and optimizing the use of packaging materials."