Heavy Loads, Light Work: The Future of Pallet Conveying
An integrator approached LEWCO, Inc. with a pallet conveying challenge. The customer needed a system to receive pallets from multiple vendors, store them until needed, and then break them down into multiple consolidated shipments for their own customers.
LEWCO’s role was to design a solution that could:
- Buffer incoming pallets for storage.
- Create picking loops to transfer products from storage pallets to outbound shipping pallets.
- Stage completed shipping pallets for wrapping and final dispatch.
Because the loads varied widely in shape and size, and weighed up to 4,000 lbs., the customer agreed that using slave pallets would provide the consistency needed for automated material handling.
Receiving Area
LEWCO supplied a Slave Pallet Dispenser at the receiving point. All inbound pallets were placed on a slave pallet to standardize the load for conveyor transport. These combined loads were then transferred to a live staging conveyor that fed the customer’s AGV system. By creating queues of three pallets per line, LEWCO met the required throughput while also reducing equipment costs.
Pick Loops
The picking area featured a combination of chain conveyors, roller conveyors, and pop-up chain transfers. Operators could pick from three different positions within each loop. The system could completely swap out accessible pallets in under 45 seconds, with both load and unload ends integrated seamlessly with the customer’s AGVs.
Finished Goods Area
LEWCO provided accumulating powered roller conveyors to feed the stretch wrapping system and stage completed pallets for lift truck removal. Slave pallets remained in place during this process, while a parallel line handled full-pallet shipments. A dual-position infeed to a pallet stacker was also provided, allowing empty slave pallets to be stacked and returned to the Receiving Area for reuse. To ensure smooth implementation, LEWCO pre-built and tested several critical sections of the system in-house before shipment, successfully validating the process and functionality prior to installation.
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