Where work in progress is sitting, how much has piled up, when it will finish: today this is answered by walking the floor. Station scanning turns it into data.
From implementation speed to long-term cost, every step is validated on site.
Starting from the operational pain points, here is how the solution is built and deployed.
Work in progress is the hardest number to count in a plant. The batch number sits on a traveller card that moves with the material, and a bundle can sit between stamping and plating for two days before anyone notices. By then the only options left are overtime and expedited freight.
Not every action needs a scan, only the points where material changes place: process completion, transfer, buffer area, inspection and rework. One scan per node records quantity, operator and time. Too many nodes and operators skip them; too few and nothing shows up. Five to eight nodes per line is a workable range.
The first layer is WIP quantity and waiting time per process, flagged when it passes a threshold. The second is the gap between actual and standard cycle time; a gap that persists points to a bottleneck. The third is the flow of rework items, because part of any WIP backlog is usually waiting for re-inspection, and reading the total alone leads to a wrong conclusion of insufficient capacity.
Multi-step machining: parts move between turning, milling and heat treatment, and the records that go missing are the handovers. Identifiers must survive coolant and washing, so metal tags or laser marking are usual.
Assembly lines: the cycle is fixed and capture moves with the station. Scanning has to fold into the assembly motion, because a standalone scan step gets skipped once the line is under pressure.
Injection moulding: alongside the unit code, record shot count and cavity so a defect can be traced to one cavity instead of quarantining the whole batch.
Check whether the WIP position is accurate in real time, whether stagnant parts surface once they pass a dwell threshold, and whether a skipped station is blocked.
Where it drifts: paper traveller cards that get swapped at each step and cost more in consumables than the tag; capture points set so close together that operators start scanning for each other; counting quantities without recording position, which gives a number nobody can locate.
A plant without MES can run this on mobile computers plus a back-end form and accumulate data first. Where MES exists, write the scan results into process reporting so the two systems do not contradict each other. When an interface is not feasible, a staging table is the cheapest option.
Covers typical operations and can be adapted to your workflow.
Core modules that keep data capture and traceability closed-loop.
Readers and mobile computers, with printers and consumables sourced together.
Zebra ZT411 industrial printer with a 4.3-inch colour touchscreen, up to 600 dpi and redundant interfaces, for mid-size lines and warehouse traceability.
Datalogic Skorpio X5: enterprise Android, octa-core Qualcomm, IP65 sealing and a 4-inch display, for warehouse, manufacturing and retail data capture.
Zebra ZD421 desktop printer with flexible interface options, covering office, retail and light industrial labelling.
Datalogic PowerScan 9100 industrial scanners, built to last, with medium and long-range 1D reading for warehouse, manufacturing and logistics.
Datalogic AV500 and AV900 high-end fixed-mount vision readers that handle attended or unattended lines and read reliably on fast conveyors.
Custom adhesive labels in coated paper, synthetic, PET and matte silver, in custom sizes and winding, with sample print trials before bulk orders.
Auto-ID and data capture solutions by industry.
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