With a multidiscipline engineering workforce that includes mechanical, electrical and automation engineers, Haden and Custance provides a turnkey solution to clients from conceptual design right through to commissioning and ongoing servicing.
Multimillion dollar projects are designed, built and tested in the region, delivered and installed for clients all over the world. From robotic palletising, picking and packing to decartoning and debagging, sweep and gantry palletisers and conveyors, plant automation and control, the company offers a solution for almost every situation.
One such solution was a sixteen lane palletising project for Goodman Fielder which has helped give the company greater efficiency and lower operating costs. The project, which incorporates four industrial robots, was designed expressly for Goodman Fielder’s Bluebird Foods division.
The system accepts product – anything from Burger Rings to Edmonds Baking Powder - on demand from every production line in the factory and delivers it to a central palletising area. The cartons are merged automatically into a single line before being barcode sorted and conveyed to one of the four robotic palletisers.
Each can accept four different conveying lines, giving the system the flexibility to handle up to 16 different products at once. Before the cartons are palletised, a best-before date is applied to each by inkjet printer. Pallets are marshalled through the system automatically and are provided to each station on demand by specialised trolley cars.
Haden and Custance later extended the full pallet outfeed to incorporate a high speed stretchwrapper and label applicator. A 52m extension to the conveyor presents completed pallets directly to the warehousing area, eliminating dangerous forktruck movements and allowing up to 90 pallets per hour to be processed.
Both systems were built, assembled and fully tested in the Haden and Custance workshop before being disassembled and trucked to Auckland. Haden and Custance specialises in integrating robotics in the consumer goods and industrial sectors, often including ABB industrial robotics and NDC automatic guided vehicles, and offers full design and build services to provide individual customer solutions.
Another high profile project which used robotics was created for Dulux Paints’ Brisbane plant. After successfully creating a solution for the company’s water-based paints palletising plant in Wellington, Haden and Custance was asked to help automate the Brisbane palletising area. The entire project used six industrial robots.
Innovations included using automation to rotate each can, ensuring the handle was positioned in exactly the right place to avoid transit damage. Other major clients include Fonterra, Carter Holt Harvey, Amcor, Visy Board, Heinz Watties, DB Breweries, Inghams, Murray Goulburn, Bega Cheese, Dairy Farmers, Bonlac Foods, Kraft Foods, Tatura Milk, AussiChar, Coating Services Australia, Dairygold UK, A McLelland and Sons UK and Great Lakes Cheese USA.
Contact: Haden and Custance Limited.
Website: www.hadencustance.co.nz