The Automation Trend
As China's economic development and industrialization continue to move forward, the production of industrial products slowly leap from "single piece and small batch" to "large batch automation" production mode. In this leap, "continuous material supply" has become an important prerequisite for automated production! Various raw materials and auxiliary materials can achieve "continuous machine feeding", also become the premise of automation transformation or mass production. This has led to a change in the "material supply form", which has been updated from the original "sheet form" or "loose material form" to "Coil form".
New Challenges For Machine Feeding
Raw materials or auxiliary materials in the form of coils, individual packages are usually large and heavy, and the feed opening on the machine is relatively high in relation to the operable floor space, and sometimes the space below the feed opening is even occupied by conveyor lines or other equipment, leaving no suitable working space for the operator to go up and down.
Machine Feeding Has Many Challenges
Larger Size (width 1000~1350mm, diameter 800~1000mm)
Heavy Piece (60~150kg)
High Feed Opening (height above ground about 800~1500mm)
No Suitable Space (usually no operator standing platform)
This leads to risky matters Dangerous, Warnings, Attention
Product quality damage. Due to the difficulty of loading, surface scratches or knocks may be produced, resulting in scrapping of raw materials or a decrease in product qualification.
Simple Solutions And Drawbacks
In view of the heavy weight of the coil, the simple solution, using a traveling crane or electric hoist for lifting, can partially solve the problem of overweight materials, the coil as a whole to lift to a high place becomes possible.
However, the use of electric hoist lifting, new drawbacks have also surfaced:
The Problem of Material Up and Down Lifting
--Shocks during operation are inevitable, whether starting, or stopping.
-- Electric hoist lift control relies on electrical impulses to drive the motor operation, a pitch of about 5mm, which cannot achieve precise positioning.
--The operator controls the hand power door with one hand and hook positioning with the other hand, so it is quite difficult to operate the material to reach the exact position.
--When the electric hoist is running, the noise is quite loud, and especially obvious when starting or stopping
The Problem with Horizontal Movement of Material
--The resistance is high when moving horizontally, and it requires great power to start or stop.
--When pushing, a large operating force is required, and when stopping, a large inertia has to be overcome, resulting in difficulties in horizontal movement and positioning.
The Problem with Multiple Materials
--When feeding coils / raw material rolls / master rolls, the single piece is too heavy and difficult to feed.
--After the raw material is used, the expansion shaft must be taken off from the machine, which also weighs 20~40kg, making it difficult to take the material.
--After the expansion shaft is removed from the machine, the paper tube on the expansion shaft needs to be removed, which is extremely inconvenient to operate.
--Before the next web feeding, the expansion shaft needs to be inserted into the inner tube of the new web raw material before starting the next machine feeding operation cycle.
In particular, electric hoists are difficult to operate, and there have been countless workplace accidents caused by operational negligence when dealing with the handling and positioning of heavier workpieces.
Is there really no better solution?
Stay tuned for the next article.