JPH06171758A - Picking system - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To efficiently cope with the delivery demand by carrying out stowing by shifting a pallet between picking means and reducing the quantity of the used pallets as little as possible. CONSTITUTION:When each package state (a), (b), (c), (d) by each different kind of picking means is supposed, in order to deliver articles W1-W5 for one delivery demand, the volume on a stowed pallet P is calculated. Then, the volume of the articles W on two pallets P or more by the different kinds of picking means is calculated, and the result is compared with the max. piling volume as the piling enabled volume on the pallet P. When the total of the volume of the articles W on two pallets P or more is less than the max. piling volume, stowing is performed by shifting the delivered pallet between the picking means such as (a) and (b), (c) and (d). Accordingly, the generation of stagnation between the transport device for the delivered pallet can be prevented, and the planary space can be economized.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a picking system including a plurality of types of picking means, and more particularly to a picking system which can use as few pallets as possible.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a shipping center or the like, a picking system is used for picking and shipping a certain number of articles of a certain type in accordance with a customer's order. The picking system is equipped with different types of picking means such as stratified pickers, palletizing robots, rear pickers that combine automated warehouses and automated guided vehicles, and pallet rack picks that use forklifts. And used according to the quantity. The articles picked on the pallet by each picking means are transported to the shipping station by a conveyor or an unmanned transport vehicle.

[0003]

In such a picking system, since the picking means is selected according to the type and quantity of the articles, the picking work can be performed in a short time, while the pallet has many picking means. The number of The pallets that have been packed are transported to a stacking place such as a transfer place to a truck, but if the number of pallets increases, congestion may occur during the transportation of the pallets and the area of the stacking place may occupy a lot. As a result, the efficiency of shipping work was deteriorated.

Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a picking system capable of efficiently processing a shipping request by reducing the number of pallets used as much as possible.

[0005]

In order to achieve the above object, the present invention is a picking system including a plurality of types of picking means, in which two or more types of picking means can be stacked for one shipping request. If necessary, if the total volume of the articles on two or more pallets to be stacked by different types of picking means is less than the maximum loading volume of one pallet, the pallets are picked up between the corresponding picking means. The picking system was configured to be moved and stowed.

[0006]

Since the present invention has the above-mentioned structure, it has the following effects.

In the picking system according to the present invention, each picking means is assigned the type and quantity of the article to be picked in order to satisfy a certain shipping requirement.
Depending on the shipping request, it may be necessary to pick a plurality of types of picking means in order to satisfy all the requests. Conventionally, in such a case, one or more pallets are used by each of two or more types of picking means.

In the present invention, first, the volume of the articles on the pallet to be stacked by each picking means is calculated. Since the volume of each item handled in the picking system is known in advance, it can be calculated if the quantity is known. Next, the volumes of the articles on the two or more pallets by the different types of picking means are summed up,
Compare with the maximum loading volume, which is the volume that can be loaded on the pallet. If the total volume of articles on two or more pallets is less than or equal to the maximum loading volume, they can be placed on one pallet, so move the pallets between the corresponding picking means to perform packing. To still,
The maximum loading volume is set in advance in consideration of the ease of handling the load as a pallet and the size and weight of the load.

[0009]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The embodiments shown in the drawings will be described below.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram schematically showing the construction of an embodiment of a picking system according to the present invention.

In FIG. 1, the picking system includes four picking means, a layered picker 1, a palletizing robot 2, a backside picker 3, and a pallet rack pick 4. Item pallets are supplied from the automated warehouse 5 to each picking means. Central control unit 6 controls each picking means and automatic warehouse 5, and each conveying means for conveying an item pallet and a shipping pallet.

The stratified picker 1 is a device for transferring the articles stacked on the item pallet from the automated warehouse 5 to the shipping pallet one layer at a time and capable of automatically picking a large amount of articles in a short time. However, it can only be used in units of one unit.

The palletizing robot 2 is an automatic warehouse 5
It is a robot that handles the articles on the item pallet sent from the machine one by one and palletizes them on the shipping pallet. Also in this case, a large number of articles can be picked in a relatively short time, and a fractional article can be palletized, which is different from the stratified picker.

The rear picker 3 comprises a combination of a small automatic warehouse and an automatic guided vehicle, and an operator takes out an article from the back surface of the lowest shelf of the automatic warehouse and places it on the automatic guided vehicle for picking. It can handle a wide variety of items, but requires manual picking.

The pallet rack pick 4 is a picking means utilizing a forklift, and mainly handles articles having shapes and weights that are difficult to handle by the layered picker 1, the palletizing robot 2, and the rear picker 3, or articles that are rarely shipped. Bring the pallets to the shelves with a forklift and manually load them.

In the palletizing system including the above-described picking means, when a certain shipping request is made, the central control unit 6 allocates the item and the quantity to be picked according to the characteristics of each picking means, and the packing is performed. Imagine the appearance of the package when it was opened.

FIG. 2 is a side view showing an imaginary packing form to be stacked by each picking means in response to a certain shipping request.

The packing styles (a), (b), (c), and (d) are, in order to satisfy one shipping requirement, respectively, in order to satisfy one shipping request,
The palletizing robot 2, the back picker 3, and the pallet rack pick 4 show the packing style to be loaded. For example, the packing form (a) is formed by stacking two layers of the articles W1, and the packing form (c) is formed by stacking the articles W3 and W4.

Since each volume of the articles W1 to W5 handled in the picking system is registered in the central control unit 6 in advance, it is possible to know the total volume of each virtual package by multiplying it by the quantity.

Furthermore, the total volume of each package is added. As shown in FIG. 2, the packing styles (a) and (b), (a)
And (c), ... (c) and (d). As a result of the addition, if the maximum loading volume of the pallet P is less than or equal to
This means that the picking can be done by one picking means and then done by another picking means.

The packing configurations (a) and (c) and (b) and (d) of FIG. 2 are shown in the lower part of FIG. Since these two packages do not exceed the maximum loading volume of the pallet P, they can be stacked together. Package (a)
The combination of (c) and (c) is obtained by stacking the articles W1 and W3 and W4 on top of the article W1 in the packing form (a). The combination of the packing forms (b) and (d) is obtained by stacking the product W2 on top of the product W2.

In order to carry out such loading, the shipping pallet is moved between the picking means. As shown in FIG. 1, the shipping pallet moves between the picking means as shown by the solid line, and is finally shipped. However, when the picking by the other picking means for the shipping pallet that has been picked by one picking means cannot be immediately started, the picking is temporarily stored in the automatic warehouse and made to stand by.

Further, the movement of the shipping pallet between the picking means is many, such as from the layered picker 1 to the palletizing robot 2, the rear picker 3, the pallet rack pick 4, and the palletizing robot 2 to the rear picker 3 and the pallet rack pick 4. It is desirable to move from a picking means that handles a quantity to a picking means that handles a small quantity. Rear picker 3 and pallet rack pick 4
This is because there are many portions where the plane of the upper surface of the article is not uniform in the packing form after the article is packed, and it is difficult to pack the article on it.

As described above, the picking system according to the present embodiment can reduce the number of pallets used to satisfy a certain shipping request. In the example shown in FIG. 2, it is possible to reduce the load of the shipping pallet transfer device to a flat pallet by using four pallets instead of four. Can be improved.
Incidentally, if the load capacity is less than or equal to the maximum load volume, the addition of the packing styles is not limited to two, and three or more may be combined and stacked.

The embodiment of the present invention has been described above.
It is needless to say that the present invention is not limited to the above-mentioned embodiments and can be appropriately modified within the scope of the gist of the present invention.

For example, the illustrated embodiment has been described as including four types of picking means, but the present invention is not limited to this, and other picking means may be included, or three or two types of picking means may be included. May be included.

[0027]

As described above, according to the picking system according to the present invention, the number of shipping pallets used in the picking system can be minimized, and thus the transportation device for shipping pallets is congested. It is possible to save the plane space and improve the ability of the picking system.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a schematic configuration of an embodiment of a picking system according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of stacking in the embodiment of FIG.

[Explanation of symbols]

 P pallet W1-5 articles

 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (72) Inventor Keiji Hayashi 1-2-3 Moto-Akasaka, Minato-ku, Tokyo Suntory Ltd. Tokyo branch office

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A picking system including a plurality of types of picking means, and when two or more types of picking means are required to be stowed for one shipping request, different picking means are stowed. If the total volume of the articles on the two or more pallets is equal to or less than the maximum loading volume of one pallet, a picking system that moves the pallets between the corresponding picking means to perform stacking.