Logistics

Musculoskeletal disorders are responsible for about one quarter of all days of incapacity to work in Germany. In order to identify which types of strain lead to an increased risk of the emergence and aggravation of work-related musculoskeletal disorders in operational intra-logistics and to identify in which types of jobs this risk especially occurs, 30 people working in different companies were interviewed. It was discovered that almost all types of manual handling of loads (lifting, carrying, pulling and pushing), and both standing permanently as well as forced sitting are relevant.

In contrast to the use of robots in standardized production processes, robots must be flexible and adaptable within dynamic logistics processes in order to cope with variable environmental conditions and non-standardized goods. Due to the recent advances in the field of artificial intelligence and networking through industry 4.0, robots will perform complex tasks in logistics in a reliable way in future. A crucial component of a robot system represents the interpretation of the work environment with the help of multi-modal sensor systems, especially image processing systems. This paper describes applications for robotic systems in logistics as well as a concrete example of focusing on the interpretation of multi-modal sensor data for the automation of a logistics task.

The most basic task of conveyor systems in intra-logistics is the transport of goods. For more complex tasks, such as rotating, sorting or layer forming, additional mechanical components are often needed. These range from simple pneumatic cylinders to complex industrial robots. This paper presents the novel and highly flexible conveyor system Celluveyor. Due to the modular design and system architecture, any plant layout can be generated and virtually any material handling task can be realized by a simple software update with one single conveyor system.

The efficient performance of service tasks on high-value capital goods like maintenance, repair and overhaul of aircrafts and railway vehicles is influenced by a turbulent environment. In this context, excellent production logistics in maintenance shops can be a way out to cope with this turbulence. This contribution describes a bottom-up approach which is the basis for improving the logistical processes by dimensioning material flow-oriented buffer stocks.

Despite increasing networking and electronic data interchange for many companies future demand curves are unstable. Resulting from demand fluctuations and deviations from planned processes, high requirements exist for production planning and control. The necessary flexibility to respond to such variations can be created by supply chain event management (SCEM). Based on the example of an automotive supplier process chain SCEM is defined and then implemented in an Advanced Planning and Scheduling System.

Having derived from the end consumer market, the idea of a sharing economy is currently increasing important in more and more economic branches. Even conservative industries such as logistics are now beginning to see the potential of resource sharing. This paper discusses the scope and conditions of transferring this approach to the field of offshore wind energy logistics. It will be shown that standardizing objects and processes as well as making supply and demand transparent are considered the basis for transferring resource sharing into offshore wind energy logistics.

The integration of information technologies in the production environment proceeds and is summarized under the term ’Industry 4.0’. As a consequence, new challenges and opportunities transform the risk landscape of supply chains substantially. Acknowledging this, our article outlines the impact of Industry 4.0 and formulates first recommendations for practitioners especially in the field of supply chain risk management.

The information economy is characterized by an excessive supply of data and information, which makes it difficult to establish an optimal information management. Therefore, this paper deals with the challenge of how an efficient information logistics can be established. An approach using the lean philosophy for identification and categorization of information is presented. The paper concludes with a practical use case example outlining the feasibilty of this approach.

We observe an ongoing increase of complexity of transport and transport-related services in road-based freight carriage as a result of increasing shipper demand. As a consequence, fleet management and fleet dispatching challenges become quite harder. A particular challenge comprises the synchronization of operations related to a complex order, in which the activities of two or more vehicles are coupled by temporal coordination constraints. This article outlines challenges and research questions related to fleet scheduling with comprehensive service requirements. We give an insight into first research results.

The industrial application of Overhead Conveyor Systems to facilitate in-house transportation is widespread. When it comes to these conventional Overhead Conveyor Systems it is usually a matter of rail-systems that are designed to carry heavy loads. According to these characteristics, such systems have a relatively high weight and later adjustment usually goes hand in hand with extensive costs. Yet especially lighter loads could be transported with significantly lower construction costs. The range of applications for ultra-lightweight payloads also enables an ultra-lightweight design of the overall construction, which in turn makes continuous adaption to the requirements of the company feasible, resulting in a high degree of flexibility.