New Carton Flow with Bearings Delivers Cost-Efficient Storage Solution

Take a good look at this picture. What you are looking at is a unique approach for using carton flow. Yes, that is Cart-Trak carton flow… and yes, it’s mounted on the floor! We had an interesting challenge for a customer, and as usual, we got “out of the box” to solve their warehousing need.

This customer uses tall boxes to store and ship insulation and filtration products. To off-load efficiently as well as to stage at the dock for loading, this simple solution will provide an extremely economical, time-saving solution.

Inventory Specs:
Boxes: 24” wide x 32” high, 15-25 lbs. each.

Designing the Solution:

The inventory changes within the boxes; however, the box width remains the same, which allows this solution to work well despite the slight variance in package weights.

This unique approach is made possible because of the new Cart-Trak carton flow rollers with bearings.

The design mounts two 12” wide sections of Cart-Trak side by side to accommodate the 24” wide boxes. The boxes are lightweight with good surface coverage, and the bearing rollers are so efficient that the Cart-Trak can be set on just 4” centers… meaning we need fewer rollers in the track. Set on a slight pitch, the bearing rollers are so efficient, in fact, that even when the boxes aren’t loaded perfectly square on the carton flow tracks, they still flow well down the lane.

See the test for yourself in Engineering Test Lab video above… simplicity divine.

When it comes to optimizing warehouse storage and fulfillment, there are many product choices. Each material handling product has a special feature or design that lends to a particular function… and that is often the best way to tackle a warehousing challenge. But, we like to look at the features and capabilities of our products with a broader view which is why the Mallard engineers often come up with unique uses for carton flow (as seen in the example above), pallet flow rack, and gravity conveyor products. If you are interested in checking out some of our more unique gravity flow product applications, check out our blog page. You can search by product type right there on the page to see all the ways we’ve explored our products… so far.

If you have a warehousing challenge, give the Mallard team a call for a new approach and some outside-the-box problem-solving.