Customer Overview
A third party logistics(3PL) provider, this player plays a crucial role in supply chain operations for multiple industries, including tires. This company is a sizable distributor and 3PL for tires in USA. Given its role as a contract logistics provider, optimizing floor loaded container and trailer unloading for improved employee wellness and efficiency is critical for it.

The Challenge

Manual unloading of tires is literally a back -breaking task. The key difficulties include:
– Heavy tires: Average weight of tires is around 25lbs with some even exceeding 40lbs, requiring workers to handle significant weight continuously
– Interlaced stacking: To maximize packing efficiency, tires are loaded in an interwoven fashion inside the truck. While this optimizes space, it makes unloading extremely difficult, requiring workers to pull tires from a tightly stacked heap.
– Automation roadblocks: No robotic system has ever been able to autonomously unload tires due to:
○ The high complexity of handling interlaced stacks.
○ The lack of a suitable gripping mechanism

The Solution

Rightbot’s Wolverine is possibly the first robotic unloading solution to automate tire unloading. With its innovative scooping-based mechanism, Wolverine can unload tires as seamlessly as it can unload carton boxes, pouches or bags. For the customer, Wolverine effortlessly broke through the interlaced stacks of tires stacked to the full height of the truck, and funneled them into a controlled, continuous flow. The robot was
able to deliver a steady unloading rate which was >3x that of manual operations.

Results & Impact

– Unloaded a 53-ft trailer filled with tires in <1 hour, thereby reducing the unloading time by
more than 75%
– Unlike manual unloading, where productivity drops progressively due to fatigue, Wolverine achieved consistent throughput across the shifts without any slowdown.

Conclusion

Wolverine successfully demonstrated the first-ever fully autonomous unloading of tire trailers, solving a problem previously deemed impossible to automate.
Furthermore, Rightbot’s ability to offer a Robotics-as-a-Service (RaaS) model makes Wolverine an attractive proposition for 3PLs.

Are you facing difficulties in unloading tires and can’t find any solution to automate the process? Discover how Wolverine can revolutionize your tire unloading operations. Contact us today!