Plastic Production Delays
A major plastics production plant needed to closely monitor bulk inventory to avoid production delays. The plant provided a variety of products fed from plastic pellet storage silos.
How are Plastic Pellets Produced?
Plastic pellets are produced by major petrochemical companies that provide it as bulk material to plastics producers. After creation on a plastic pelletizing line, the pellets are trucked to a production plant, moved by plastic pellet transfer systems, and fed into storage silos.
How is Polyvinyl Chloride Produced?
PVC, a light powder, comes from the chemical transformation of salt and oil. Saltwater turns to chlorine, which is combined with ethylene. It then turns into a vinyl monomer, then a PVC resin. Major manufacturers of PVC are located in the United States, Mexico, China, and South Korea.
PVC is the world’s third most widely produced synthetic polymer of plastic. In the U.S., about 40 million tons of PVC are produced each year. PVC powder is stored in silos prior to being delivered or packaged. Storage silos can be large, containing thousands of tons per silo.
The Problem:
The plant juggled multiple types, colors, and densities of raw materials to meet production demand. Some bulk inventory was customer-owned Inventory, while other raw materials were company-owned.
Employees climbed each bin multiple times per day to report on inventory levels. This made material ordering and communication a bit jumbled.
The Solution:
BinMaster`s solution for all raw materials—including pellets and PVC powder—was a system of 3DLevelScanners that monitored each container and tank. Inventory was delivered into one easy-to-access cloud report shared by multiple departments and to those managing customer-owned Inventory.
The 3DLevelScanners worked great in dusty silos and storage with varying dielectric constants. The system is perfect for the plastics industry thanks to the scanners` low-frequency, acoustic-based technology.
3DLevelScanners deliver accurate, reliable, and continuous non-contact volume measurements in real time with ResinView® bulk inventory management software, tailored to the resin production industry.