You might have seen it before on the discovery channel before how the manufacturing and packaging process in mass production industries like stationery, clothes, automobile spare parts, food, etc. is a very long process and requires a lot of manual power along with mechanical power which goes hand in hand to make the process just a little bit faster. Have you ever wondered what are the machines that are used and why? If you did you are in the right place, in this article you will almost all the machines used in those industries and why.
- The very first and very commonly used one is a conveyor belt. These are metal belts made mostly out of iron. They are continuous moving strips that roll on metal ball bearings which are used to move large volumes of materials to save time and energy for manual labor. They were first invented in the year 1892, Thomas Robins has started experimenting with such things which eventually led to the conveyor belt invention.
- The next machine is the forklift. It was first founded in 1906. However, it was as efficiently working until 1917 when the industries vastly started to use it. It is just a basic lifting machine that is used to lift heavy amounts of goods. They were used to transport wooden or steel shipments in the warehouse, and are now being used for anything too heavy for just one human being to lift.
- And then we have the scissor lift table. It is a machine that helps one to comfortably elevate the surface they were working on to their desired height. It was invented because of the rising concern of the workers in industries hurting their backs because of the constant lifting and bending. They are mostly at the packaging units for the workers’ convenience.
- There are also machines like dock lifts which are also used to lift large amounts of any type of goods, while forklifts are used to stock up in the warehouse dock lifts are used to load and unload the goods into a truck. There is a lot of different mechanical equipment used to lift the goods in the warehouses, they operate just like any other lift but the purpose is just a little different.
- The industries use the wrapping machine to wrap up bulky packages for distribution to the retailers. It is a machine that rotates the goods while wrapping them all up into a big block with plastic. It helps save time and space while loading and unloading and it is most probably the last machine used in the packaging process of most industries.
- There are pallet gates that are used to protect workers from objects falling from a height or sometimes protect the workers from falling while they are on heights loading and unloading stuff.
The above-mentioned machine is the most likely the common ones used in almost all the industries apart from the ones that are customized to fit the purpose of the particular industry.