Posts Tagged ‘platform’

Using Industrial Scales in your Warehouse

Wednesday, June 10th, 2009

Using an industrial scale in a warehouse environment can reap many rewards, most significantly a drop in man hour and labour time.  Whilst you may sometimes agree that industrial scales can be large, cumbersome and take up valuable warehouse space you can, these days, buy weighing scales that are light enough to be stored away when not in use and yet strong enough to withstand every day usage of 2 tonne pallets or more.

Beam scales are a good option to consider when space is limited.  These are often made from two pieces of durable U-section steel and are light enough to be picked up and stored away when not needed.  A cable will often connect the two beams together follewed by a second cable to take the signal from the beams to the weighing indicator.  The indicators for such weighing equipment would more than likely be mains powered meaning you would need to use the beam scale somewhere near a mains socket, however battery powered indicators would give you the freedom of being able to use the scales anywhere and offer you the best in portability.  Beam scales would also offer you the freedom of being able to weigh pretty much any size pallet or box by simply adjusting the distance between the beams.  This is especially handy if you have many different size items to weigh.

For a more permanant fixture you may consider a larger industrial platform scale.  These are commonly found to be around 1.2 metres square but can be produced to any size required.    When pit-mounted, these scales would be able to offer you the advantage of simply driving your pallet onto the platform with a pallet truck or fork truck for complete ease of use.

For the ultimate amount of portability in a warehouse or industrial application, you could consider a pallet truck scale.  These handy pieces of equipment look and act like a pallet truck but with the added benefit of a weighing scale being built into the chassis, therefore allowing you to take the scales to the weight rather than the weight to the scales, something which could save you hundreds of man hours.

We hope this article is of some use to you, but as always please feel free to call us or visit www.scalesonline.co.uk for further information if and when you need it.

Counting Scales used to save time and effort

Thursday, May 14th, 2009

When counting parts or pieces by hand you will often find that it can be a tiresome and inaccurate job by anyones standards.  Imagine then having the luxury available to you to simply tell a scale what each individual piece weighs and then it doing the counting for you.  This luxury need not be expensive with a vast range of recently launched counting scales onto the market.

Counting scales can come in all different shapes and sizes, but typically are large enough to fit on a desk and have three displays on the front.  Each individual display tells you something different, but each add up to provide you with the same time and cost saving information.  You will normally have one display telling you the overall weight, one telling you the piece weight and one telling you the quantity counted.

Most counting scales will give you the facility to tell the scale how much each individual item weighs as well as the often preferred method of adding a sample quantity to the platform.  The latter simply requires you to put, for instance, ten items on the scale followed by a key press to tell the scale that there are ten items present.  The scale will then do the maths necessary to work out how much each individual item weighs and will proceed to count accurately for you.  As with any mathematics involved, the higher the sample quantity the more accurate the piece weight will be and therefore the more accurate your counting will be.

In some instances the counting scale will have a second scale input.  This allows you to attach, as an example, an industrial weigh beam scale.  With the second scale attached you can switch between scale 1 or scale 2 on the display and have parts counting abilities on either scale.  This can be especially useful when some items you are counting need finer accuracy and lower capacity which you would use the desk mounted scale for, or switch to the larger beam scale for counting heavier items on pallets.

We hope this article is of some use to you, but as always please feel free to call us or visit www.scalesonline.co.uk for further information if and when you need it.

Bench Scales and their place in the Office

Tuesday, May 12th, 2009

Weighing items for shipping and receiving requires both an accurate scale and one robust enough for everyday usage.  Parcel shipping scales often come in a small form factor that can be used on a desk or bench.  Capacities can vary, but more often than not a 30Kg capacity would be more than adequate for most people as this is the limit of what one person can safely lift onto a bench platform and is often the limit of most carriers on a per item basis.

An important factor when considering bench scales is the size of the platform.  Is the platform big enough for what you need to weigh?  Is it small enough so it doesnt obstruct your other work duties?  Will you be able to see the display when you are weighing your items?  More modern day scales come with the ability to detach the facia from the weighing base and therefore allow you to see the display even when weighing over sized items.  Also, will the scale be suitable in a plastic housing, or would a stainless steel platform be better?

Finally, you may need to consider whether scale needs to be battery operated or mains powered.  A mains powered scale is often the most reliable as you never need to worry about batteries running out and finding out you can not use your scale until the batteries are replaced, however for convenience sake a battery powered scale can also have its benefits such as no trailing wires, or using up already limited plug sockets.

These are just a few points to consider when buying a scale for your office/workshop environment.  If you would like any further advise or assistance when purchasing a scale, please feel free to call us or visit www.scalesonline.co.uk.