Loading Automated Guided Vehicle

Fig. 2.73.3. Automated guided vehicle (AGV) running in a sterile corridor for the automatic loading and unloading of three freeze dryers. (GlaxoSmithKline, Parma, Italy).

Goetz, W. G., and Egbelu, P. J. (1990), Guide Path Design and Location of Load Pick-up Drop-off Points for an Automated Guided Vehicle System, bUemational Journal of Production Research, Vol. 28, No. 5, pp. 927-941. 

The decision to load and unload the vials in isolators excludes the method of automated guided vehicles as shown in fig. 27(a) [2]. It requires a push and pull system, in which the vials are transported by conveyors from the filling machines to a platform before the drying chamber. Figure 13 (in this plant no isolators are used), pushed from there onto the shelves and pulled from the shelves after drying to the table and then transported from there to the capping installation. The capacity for both plants should be specified as 10,000 vials/h to have the same system twice. (In an isolator it will be very difficult to move a loading system from one plant to another.)... 

Automated Guided Vehicle (AGV The early applications of AGVs were limited to warehouse operations for towing trains of carts. In recent years, the trend has been toward auto loading in a fully automated facility. The new AGVs have the ability to pick up a load and deliver it anywhere in a plant without human intervention. In smaller production systems, miniload AGVs have been developed to handle small items. 

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