So they may not be as cute as “WALL-E,” but at least they’re real. And they work like crazy.

“They” are two mechanized robotic units designed and built by Ambridge-based Lightfoot Systems, and they’re being put to work at a major distribution center in Atlanta to assemble cases of wine and spirits in specific combinations to fill individual orders for shipping all over the country – a task otherwise known in the distribution trade as “case picking.”

“Case picking now in distribution centers is all done manually,” explained Matt Beck, Director of Automation Systems for Lightfoot. “You live and die by whether the product ships with the right order, every night, on time. There are very tight delivery windows. With such heavy cases, productivity slows down, it’s hard to find and retain people to do this physically taxing, high-pressure work. Employees can end up throwing cases – literally – because it saves time and alleviates the physical strain. But that sometimes leads to product damage and problems down the line as bottles start to leak.”

Enter Lightfoot and its robo-pickers.

“A case of wine weighs 40 pounds, which is about at the upper limits for repetitive manual lifting according to OSHA regulations,” Beck said. “Our robot can handle the cases better.”

The Lightfoot robot is mounted on a vertical metal mast that can be as high as each individual application requires. At the Atlanta installation, for example, the mast will be nearly 30 feet tall. Eight vacuum cups on each robot grab the cases of wine, with each cup capable of lifting and moving 25 pounds on its own. The vacuum cups work on cardboard, wood, and non-porous surfaces, while a “hand” on the robot adjusts and twists to handle placement and movement of cases.

The robot’s arm extension was custom developed to get into tight stacking and racking on pallet shelves, typically allowing a 16-inch clearance between the tops of the cases and the shelves above. Machining on the robot units was contracted out, but everything else on the robot, the mounting mast and the tracks on which the whole thing moves, were built by Lightfoot.

“The entire unit can move five feet per second – it could go faster, but we’re limiting it to that speed for now,” Beck noted. “The whole structure weighs 1,200 pounds. Our production target is 300 cases an hour on average.”

Going the robotic route represents value to Lightfoot customers on a number of levels, he said.

“The distribution facility can better plan its work because our units permit it to project productivity and time frames required for any given shift,” Beck said. “This helps plan pallet positioning and replenishment, and allows for better timing for trucks to arrive at the loading dock for shipping. The labor replacement inherent in the robots adds value, too.

“Because we take the robot to the product, the need to make major changes to the physical structures of distribution facilities is minimized, as well.”

National Distributing Co. (NDC) in Atlanta is installing two Lightfoot robots that will work on a single track, with the new system going live in late September. As pallets arrive at the distribution center, they are stacked along high shelves running alongside the Lightfoot robots’ track. The robots will then use pre-programmed order forms to read barcodes on the pallets, select the appropriate cases to fill specific orders, and place those orders together on an adjacent assembly line, where they are wrapped and coded for shipping before being sent to the loading dock. The goal is to complete 3,000 orders – made up of 20,000 cases picked and grouped – each night.

Second and third robotic lines are being planned now, with other NDC facilities being considered to use the Lightfoot robotic system, Beck said. ■