High-end automation at polyester fiber plant

Fiber Polymers, Fibers, Texturing, and Spunbonds
High-end automation System handles
production at polyester fiber plant
V. Schmid, Autefa automation GmbH, Friedberg/Germany
Today automation in filament yarn pro
duction is a commonly used method to
ensure product quality, increase productivity and reduce labor costs all at the
according to the tube type - different pal
let patterns. For this packing cell the palletizing robot uses a multifunctional grip
per so that this machine is enabled to
already existing installation for which the
biggest challenge had been to design
and develop a concept which fits into the
available Space which had been very
Installation
limited. The connection point to the exist
handle different tube types and all re-
customers still request additional value,
ing installation is the loading of the Aute
quired packing material without chang
i.e. new functions, which cannot be real-
fa BRS monorail carriers (Bobbin Rail-
ized by manual Operation.
The new automation System by Autefa
automation GmbH, Friedberg/Germany,
way System) from the POY storage. Unloading doffers pass on the bobbins to
ing the gripping unit.
An alternative transport destination of
same time. Furthermore,
which was handed over to VaiLesina (a
member of the Radici group) at the be-
ginning of 2003 is an example for such a
high sophisticated Installation.
ValLesina's goal was to install a new
bobbin handling System connected to an
these POY bobbins is the texturing area
which is located in an adjacent building.
In order to compensate the Splitting ofthe
store-out orders resulting from the type
the waiting BRS carrier.
This BRS System transports a predefined number of bobbins, depending on
the pallet size, by
means of individu-
ally
BRS
controlled
carriers
POY Storage
-
maximum capacity
in this project 8
bobbins per carrier
- to a robot pack
ing cell. On this Po
sition the bobbins
BRS Mi.rioi.nl System
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POYPacking Cell
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are unloaded from
the
BRS Shuttle,
palletized and the
complete pallet is
then transported
to the final packing
Position,
where
the pallet finishing
is done. The POY
bobbins
handled
MJS Multl-tray storage
CbMan buffeit'f.
,
Creel Cait laxiing loi
SMng
DIY Dense Packing Cell
until this position
Box finishing
can have different
tube
diameters.
Fig. 1
Highly integrated arrangement of the
store-in, inspection and packing area
276 CHEMICAL FIBERS INTERNATIONAL
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Thus the palletiz-
ing robot creates -
Fig. 2 Material flow of the installed System
Volume 53, September 2003
FIBER PRODUCTION
of storage for POY, BRS buffer tracks are
above. The identification is read by the
the multi-tray storage without any film
located after the texturing area, on which
the Single orders (lots/ qualities) are
Autefa system and serves as basis for
the data transfer between VaiLesina
protection.
The entirely store-in area described
brought together again (sorted).
host Computer to the Autefa data base.
above has been mounted approx. 4.5 m
Thus the customer is able to arrange any
The same robot handles POY as well as
number of type-pure creel carts (identical product/lot and quality).
There, by means of a robot, the bobbins
DTY bobbins without the necessity of
changing the bobbin gripper.
are taken over from the BRS carriers
and loaded onto creel carts which for
bins transport the bobbins to a store-in
comfortable Operation, are buffered by a
small conveyor loop. Each creel cart has
a barcode enabling the customer's material management system to take over
spected first, prior to be stored intermediately for accumulating the amount required for creating a pallet.
Autefa developed for the inspection re-
all bobbin data, with the corresponding
quirements, defined by VaiLesina, a
highly sensitive, fully automatic bobbin
inspection system, which could even exceed the high expectation of the cus
than 0.4 mm within each optical-geo-
above floor level due to this very restricted available space. The packing posi
tion, which will be described in the fol
lowing, is situated below this platform.
The DTY bobbins are placed on multi
trays (MT), metal plates with plastic caps
for ensuring the precise bobbin positions, having a capacity of 21 bobbins
per MT. By means of a SRU (storage retrieval unit), a speciaily designed stacker
crane the MT is transported to an empty
cell inside the storage. In this storage
bobbins of different products and differ
ent quantities are buffered until the mini
mum number of bobbins for starting to
create a pallet has been achieved.
This multi-tray concept has been installed
in more than 25 Systems worldwide during the last 5 years. It is successfully operated by the major man-made fiber pro-
metrical axis contour
ducers to their entire satisfaction.
loading position on the creel cart, in Or
der to track each Single bobbin (including data) through the texturing process.
By means of this data tracking the cus
tomer has the possibility to determine
The BRS carriers loaded with DTY bob
area where the bobbins have to be in-
tomer. At this Station the following Pa
rameters are checked:
which DTY bobbin has been made of
which POY bobbin. Furthermore this da
• diameter accuracy: equal or better
ta tracking system enables Autefa to of
fer a quality management system fulfilling highest demands as an operational
• geometry accuracy: equal or better
tool. In case of a customers complaint
• density (calculated of weight and volume): 0.03 g/cm3
• Easy, reliable designs: a self-carrying
• broken filament: ränge dtex 20-890
steel structure; no moving parts ex-
with 6 um minimum filament diameter.
In case of the broken filament measurement a resolution of even 6 micron could
cept SRU; no Supports to the building
by special steel work.
VaiLesina has the possibility to track
each Single DTY bobbin of a pallet back
to the POY spinning position.
After the texturing process the produced
DTY yarn is taken over from the creel
cart by the same robot and loaded onto
monorail carriers. The transfer of bobbin
data necessary for the further proceeding is carried out via the same creel cart
barcode already mentioned further
than 0.4 mm
Advantages of this patented system are:
be realized which was urgently required
by VaiLesina for the examination of its
new product, named "Super Micrell".
This super microfiiament has a diameter
per filament of dtex 0.3. The accuracy of
the broken filament measurement was
reached with a highly sophisticated camera and highest accuracy weighing technology, which had been especially de
veloped and designed by Autefa for this
demanding customer's request.
In the meantime all key components and
technologies of this automatic bobbin in
spection have been patented by Autefa.
Based on the determined inspection results the bobbins had been divided into
Fig. 3 Fully automated inspection system
different quality grades. For this installa
tion the database design is kept flexible
Fig. 5 Manual pick-out position of multi-tray (MT)
storage with SRU
and configured for
a total number of
Ei
Ja .
approx. 45 quality
grades. Every Sin
gle bobbin is labeled according to
the parameter desired by the cus
tomer. As an Op
tion the customer
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terial flow whether
to "filmbag", pack
the
film,
bobbins
or
into
whether
the bobbins are to
Fig. 4 Aisle view of multi-tray storage
278 CHEMICAL FIBERS INTERNATIONAL
be transported into
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Fig. 6 Visualization screen for dense packing algorithm
Volume 53, September 2003
FIBER PRODUCTIOM
DTY bobbins from the multi tray storage
is another creel cart loading robot, next
• Highest possible capacity: storage cells
can be adapted, depending on the bob
bin tube length, to every height. Height
to the sizing production area, which loads
pre-selected bobbins on waiting creel
carts. Therefore, another special algo
rithm had to be developed, which enables
VaiLesina to define even the running
length of the bobbin dependent from the
later position of the bobbin in the sizing
of storage itself up to 18 m.
• Fast construction.
• Free access to each Single bobbin: by
means of a Single gripper, each bobbin
can be taken from a multi-tray without
touching the remaining bobbins of the
MT. This is a big advantage compared
creel. Due to the numerous different Pa
rameters that have to be considered
to a pin storage system.
• Implementation of each packing rule
including down grade packing.
• Highest flexibility in the packing strategy: Due to fast access to each MT in
approx. 25 s (independently from the
storage position), it is possible to react
fast and flexible on short-term modifi-
cations of packing orders.
Due to the possibility of a fast and individual access to each Single bobbin in
the storage the use of costly conveyor
sorting lines and conveyor transportation
is avoided. The store-in position and the
packing position, both on different levels,
are connected via the SRU.
An Innovation on the world market in the
DTY packing is the dense packing technology speciaily developed by Autefa for
VaiLesina. This, in the meantime also
patented, packing procedure makes it
possible to pack bobbins of different out
er diameter - without any pinlocaters -
Fig. 7 Dense packing cell for DTY bobbins
layer by layer by taking maximum ad
vantage of the existing Space on the pal
let layer. The developed algorithm for the
placing of the bobbins in boxes reaches
a packing density, which even can not be
achieved by skilled Operators.
Due to the optimized positioning into cartons without any gaps between the bob
bins a possible tilting of the bobbins is
avoided. This new innovative packing
mode is not only more economical regarding personnel. Due to the increased
efficiency less packing material is required and because of the higher pack
ing density also shipping costs are
saved. A higher packing density of just
5% can lead to savings of hundreds of
thousands of Euro per year in case of a
big installation.
An additional transport destination for
Only
the Best
when loading the creel cart this function
can never be effected manually by Oper
ators. Depending on the layers of the Sin
gle DTY bobbins, the different creel cart
positions arise within a "sizing" order.
Such an order can consist of up to 48
creel carts with up to 1440 ends. In this
case every Single bobbin position of the
order is pre-determined so that the effi
ciency in the production process could al
so improve decisively.
Summary
Bytaking over this automation system of
Autefa automation VaiLesina is able to
produce products fulfilling very high
quality demands requested by today's
market. The parameters used for quality
determination of the bobbins in this in
stallation are unique on the market and
thus will offer VaiLesina decisive advan-
tages for the future.
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PACO
Paul GmbH & Co.
WMV.pacc-online.com
eMail: info@paco-online.com
Metallgewebe-und Filterfa
Tel.: M9-66 63-978-0
36396 Steinau a.d. Stra§e
Germany
Fax:+49-6663-919116
P.O. Box 1220