Vacuum Lifters Solve Manual Handling of Door Cores
3rd February 2021
Palamatic Vacuum Lifters solve manual handling of door cores, for Leading Fire Door Manufacturer
Our long standing customer, Ahmarra Door solutions has over 10 Palamatic vacuum lifters on site for handling boards and doors up to 120kg. They are one of the UK’s leading fire door manufacturers and have been manufacturing door sets for over 25 years.
Vicky Boulton, Marketing and Compliance Manager, gave an insight into their company and how COVID has affected the requirements of their customers.
‘‘Our core services include the design, manufacture, installation and project management of bespoke internal doorsets and glazed screens. We work closely with architects, contractors, interior designers and property developers to meet the bespoke requirements of their projects. Ahmarra’s diverse portfolio covers education, airports, commercial buildings/offices, healthcare, hotel & hospitality, social housing, student accommodation and luxury homes.
Ahmarra have fared well during COVID as we have been able to divert our manufacturing from the affected sectors such as housing, airport and construction sites to priority sectors that continue to require doorsets, such as healthcare and schools.’’
Vicky explained how the Palamatic lifting equipment assists their operators. ‘‘The vacuum lifters make moving heavy door cores easier and quicker. It enables us to lift the door cores on and off the machinery and workbenches in our production facility. It’s also beneficial from a health and safety perspective, as it helps prevent our staff from the risks of repetitive strain and back injuries’’.
Palamatic work closely with our customers to provide door lifting systemsand equipment that are fit for the purpose and keep operators and products safe.
Vicky added, ‘We how found Palamatic to be very efficient and proactive. They offer Ahmarra good solutions for improving our lifting processes, which have been very beneficial enabling us to manufacture.’
Safety of the lifting system is always a priority. The combination of the lifting and gripping functions requires no special interlocks or devices. A quick-acting non-return valve and a suction force vs. lifting force safety factor of 2.5 times prevent the load from being inadvertently dropped – even in the event of a mains power failure.
Applications we regularly provide equipment for include loading and unloading Vertical panel saws, Beam saws, Dimension saws, Flatbed CNC stations Edgebanders and Laminators, Paint lines, Tilt tables.
We are also often asked to rotate boards through 90 degrees or 180 degrees for loading and unloading purposes. Another request we get is to grip doors by their edges, instead of using suction on the flat face, for example, to avoid wet paint/glue, which our systems can do with ease.
With our 22,000sq/ft factory based in Chesterfield, Derbyshire we are well placed to visit customer sites, and for customers to send us samples to test prior to us manufacturing their vacuum tube lifter. We have a skilled field engineering team to install the systems and come in to train your operators.
Due to the high demand for lifting systems in the woodworking industry we recommend companies take up a service contract to ensure their systems are kept in good working order.
If you have an application you would like us to come and look at, please visit our website www.palamatic.com, email us at sales@palamatic.com or phone us directly on 01246 452054