For an international automobile supplier H+H Herrmann + Hieber developed (and successfully installed) a system by which coils of different materials, with various dimensions and weighing up to 3.5 tonnes in the goods reception area can be economically handled and transported.
The pre-material is delivered to the goods reception area in trucks, and stored upright in a high-bay store, on pallets.
During truck transport the coils are positioned horizontally. For unloading, they can be taken up and transported by a fork-lift or a crane with C-hooks. For storage, they have to be tilted and positioned upright.
For this, a so-termed coil rotator is used. This is a tilting support that can rotate though 90 degrees, with a prismatic support surface on one side and a flat surface on the other side.
For storage the coils are placed on the prisms of the coil rotator. The device tilts through 90 degrees and so positions the coils upright on their end faces. When retrieving from store this process can also take place in the converse direction. For capacity reasons, in the goods reception area two of these coil rotators have been installed in parallel.
The upright coils are transported farther by a coil gripper than can move in two planes, to which a spreading mandrel is attached. At the lower end of this are arranged two fold-out surfaces. When necessary these – together or individually – can be extended under the coil so that the wound layers cannot slip down due to lack of support.
During coil transport by means of floor trolleys the positioning of the horizontal coil on the prism supports of the coil rotator is problematic. To ensure that the forks of the floor trolley do not collide with the perpendicular support surface and possibly damage it, the prismatic support is made mobile. To deposit the coil the support moves back. As soon as the tilting process has begun, the coil is moved far enough for its end face to rest against the flat support surface of the coil rotator. During the rotation process uncontrolled movements are prevented.
