Rockwell Automation Arena Packaging Users Guide - Manual (Page 37)

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shifts need to be defined for Saturday and Sunday, although Saturday and Sunday must
appear in the Daily Schedule list.
The beginning of the simulation (time 0.0) is midnight before the first day. If days are
specified, the first day simulated will be Monday.
If costing is being applied to operators, costs are assigned only to Working (User-
Defined), Lunch, On-Duty Idle, and Break times.
Palletizer module
D ESCRIPTION
Palletizers model the physical ends of a line where units are stored onto or removed from
pallets. Each module defines either a palletizing or depalletizing piece of equipment.
Palletizers are one of the possible interfaces to the discrete world. A palletizer turns
individual units from a high-speed process into discrete pallets. A depalletizer turns
discrete pallets into units for high-speed processing.
A depalletizer is located at the front of a high-speed line. It removes pallets from storage
and then sweeps units off the pallets onto the downstream conveyor. A palletizer is
located at the end of a high-speed line. It sweeps units off the upstream conveyor onto
pallets, and then places the pallets into storage.
It is important to note that Machine modules may also be used to model basic sources or
sinks of a processing line. Machine modules are more efficient than Palletizer modules
with regard to model execution speed. Therefore, if an end element can be modeled as a
simple “rate-in” or “rate-out” process with reliability, scheduled stop, or changeover
constraints, the Machine module is recommended.
Palletizer modules are most useful when:
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Discrete batching of units onto or off of the line is a key issue in your problem solving.
The Palletizer module easily allows you to discretize high-speed, high-volume flow
into layers and pallets. Discrete entities representing these layers or pallets can be
received from or sent to “low-speed” portions of your modeled system.
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You have supply or storage constraints in your model. In conjunction with the Storage
module, the Palletizer module allows you to model the starvation of depalletizing
equipment at the front of a high-speed line due to inadequate supplies of raw material.
Similarly, you can model the blockages of palletizing equipment at the end of a high-
speed line due to inadequate storage space for finished product.