Order Picking Lab 3D
About this app
Person to goods in a 3D multi-aisle warehouse: a picker walks the order with S-shape, return, midpoint, largest gap, combined or optimal routing after Ratliff-Rosenthal, and the traces stay on the floor. Setup, travel, grab and dead time grow live; batching, zones, pick-by-light and voice, ABC by picks and goods to person in a performance comparison. Case DC Neckar.
With explain mode: an AI tutor walks you through the app, points out what matters in the scene and answers your questions.
What picking time consists of
According to VDI 3590 the time for a picking order consists of setup time, travel time, grab time and dead time. In person-to-goods picking, travel is often the largest share. It depends on the routing strategy, the order in which aisles are visited. Simple rules such as S-shape, return, midpoint or largest gap can be applied without a computer. The optimal route for a warehouse with two cross aisles is found by the method of Ratliff and Rosenthal. Larger gains often come from batching several orders and from goods-to-person systems.
What the app shows
In the fictional distribution centre DL Neckar a picker with a cart walks through a block of 12 aisles and 2,880 bin locations, and the trace stays on the floor. A stacked time bar shows the four time shares live. Over 400 orders the mean travel per order is 184.3 m with S-shape, 193.0 m with return, 154.7 m with midpoint, 152.9 m with largest gap, 157.5 m combined and 145.5 m optimal. With S-shape, paper lists and single orders the travel share is 48.2 %. A batch of 4 orders reaches 103.4 lines per hour, goods to person 462.
What you can try
Choose a strategy and follow the tour step by step with bin codes and time bar. Batch several orders, split the warehouse into up to three zones and switch between paper, scanner, voice and pick-by-light. Arrange the items by picks into ABC zones, within-aisle or across-aisle, and compare which arrangement suits which strategy. The comparison panel sets person to goods against goods to person. All times are disclosed teaching assumptions.
Frequently asked questions
- Which routing strategy is shortest in order picking?
- The optimal route after Ratliff and Rosenthal. In the app it averages 145.5 m per order over 400 orders. Largest gap comes close at 152.9 m and midpoint at 154.7 m.
- What are setup, travel, grab and dead time?
- The time shares of a picking order per VDI 3590: setup for taking over and handing in the order, travel for walking, grab for picking the items and dead time for reading, searching and confirming. In the app dead time per line depends on the aid used, from 10 s with paper to 4 s with pick-by-light.
- What does batching orders achieve?
- One tour serves several orders, so setup time and travel are spread over more lines. In the app the S-shape performance rises from 58.6 lines per hour with single orders to 103.4 with 4 orders per batch.
- How much does goods to person achieve?
- In the model with a shuttle tote store and one put-to-light workstation, 462 lines per hour. The system limits this at 450 totes per hour; the person alone would manage 547.6.
Subject: Warehouse and factory planning
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