At Garvey we understand that maximizing line efficiency is how our customers measure their success and we give them the tools to do that. Our patented technology and years of experience can give your production or packaging line a competitive advantage by breaking bottlenecks and reducing maintenance while saving floor space and energy consumption. We have numerous ways to convey, accumulate, orient, single file, combine, and lane your product without backpressure and operator interference.

Use our video system above to find a product similar to yours. We would love to have one of our trained engineers visit your facility and perform a free line analysis and efficiency study to see if Garvey can help you improve your overall operational efficiency. We have helped companies all over the world improve their thruput by 20-30%.

- Ben Garvey

How do I know if I need accumulation?
Every production line has a bottleneck.  If downtime on other machines causes the bottleneck to shut down, you will benefit from accumulation.

How big should my buffer tables be?  What size accumulation table do I need?
The accumulation size should be equal to the machine with the longest average repair time on the line, other than the constraint.

Can I get a Garvey representative to take a look at my production line and make recommendations?
Sure!  Our sales engineers would love to stop by your facility and do a free line analysis.  To find the right person for your area, visit our contact page.

Can you maintain orientation while accumulating?
We have two accumulators (Serpentine, and Quadra Flo) that maintain orientation while accumulating.  Our Bi Flo and Infinity tables can also maintain orientation if direction is unimportant (ie. which way the label is facing).

Can you handle my product on an Infinity?
Send product samples to our address.  We’ll run them on our test unit and send you a video of the results.

Can an Infinity save floor space?
Other accumulation solutions require mass flow conveyors snaking back and forth and long pressureless combiners to single file the product.  Our tables accumulate and single file in one machine saving a tremendous amount of floor space.

Can an Infinity save energy consumption?
Our Infinity table uses far fewer motors and variable frequency drives than a traditional mass flow accumulation system and that means less electricity.  It’s clean construction requires less water during sanitation shifts.  If you use a soap and water lubrication system, it will also use less water than a mass flow conveyor system.

Is accumulation compatible with Lean Manufacturing?
We like to use the term Lean Accumulation to describe our approach to production.

1. Not enough accumulation hurts efficiency and requires everything to run longer to make production goals.
2. Too much accumulation is wasteful since after a certain point it provides a dimishing rate of return.
3. The wrong kind of accumulation wastes energy, water, and floorspace.
4. Putting accumulation in the wrong location won’t help overall efficiency.

Garvey’s approach to accumulation is to:

1. Size the accumulation appropriately
2. Reduce resource consumption
3. Finding the optimal place in the line for accumulation

Visit our contact page and set up an appointment with one of our experience sales engineers who can help answer all these questions about your line.

Gap Transporter – Move products across a gap for coding on the bottom, line segregation, or end transferring.

We have a number of special handling devices to help make things easier for your production line.

Tray Unloader – Manually introduce trays of vials into a system efficiently.

Tray Loader – Put vials into a tray semi-automatically.

Down Vial Reject – Removing down vials from a system without operator interaction.

Gap Transporter – Move products across a gap for coding on the bottom, line segregation, or end transferring.

Clean Room Transfer – Move vials in or out of clean room environments, leaving a small opening for just one product.

Gripper Elevator / Lowerator – Convey a product higher or lower in a small amount of space.

Inspection Station – Allows an operator to ergnomically inspect  or pack vials against a black or white background for defects.

Toyota pioneered modern Lean manufacturing and created a highly efficient and reliable manufacturing system the rest of the world adopted. Lean philosophy says to closely examine manufacturing processes, find unnecessary steps, and eliminate them. By only allowing room for “value added” steps, product will be produced simpler and faster. Value added steps are defined as any step that creates value for the customer. Accumulating work in process does not add value, so conventional Lean thinking is to eliminate this wasteful step.

To get the same results in throughput, cost per case, and overall operation efficiency, you need to spend additional time and money making sure value added steps are running at ultra-high, possibly unattainable, efficiencies. A line with six 97% efficient machines only operates at 83% due to their compounding effect. Even getting each machine to 99% only raises overall line efficiency to 94%. The most efficient way for production lines to maximize efficiency is to employ Lean Accumulation.

Lean Accumulation uses four key elements. The desired results will not occur if one or more is neglected.

Location:
The accumulator should be located to prevent downtime on the line’s constraint operation. It should either maintain a constant flow of material to the constraint or be ready to accept finished product from the constraint.

Size:
Excessive accumulation wastes floor space and insufficient accumulation causes downtime, so how do you appropriately size an accumulator? Every machine on the line has a Mean Time to Repair (MTR). In Lean Accumulation, your accumulator size is equal to the line’s longest MTR (ie. a three minute MTR needs three minutes of accumulation).

Training:
Every accumulator has a normal state. Upstream from the constraint, its normal state is full. Downstream from the constraint, its normal state is empty. Operators need to know how accumulation fits into the team’s production goals and make decisions that always bring the accumulator back to its normal state. Decisions may include when to raise or lower machine rates, which problems to fix first, or when it is ok to briefly leave a station unattended.

Consolidation:
Every production line has several other non-value added steps, such as single filing, multi-laning, orienting, hand loading/unloading, etc. Combining these operations into the accumulator reduces cost, energy usage, and overall floor space.

For a quote, contact Bob Schaeffer at 1-800-257-8581, x135. If possible, send along a CAD drawing.

Some of our capabilities include:

• High precision laser cutting for steel and other metals
• Computer controlled milling for plastic, wood, etc.
• Bending, welding, polishing services
• Part designing using AutoCAD and Solidworks
• Assembly, packaging, and shipping

A example of some of our machining capabilities.