Berner Oberland Bahnen AG operates several railroad routes in Switzerland. Its warehouse had to be modernized in the course of replacing its rolling stock, because there was too little space in the old storage facility due to the growing number of spare parts kept in stock and the long distances involved for the employees retrieving them. In order to reduce these distances and increase picking speed, the company decided to integrate automated storage systems from Kardex Remstar.

Benefits at a glance

• High storage capacity on a small footprint
• Picking accuracy increased
• Reduced travel time in the warehouse
• Productivity improved
• Accurate overview of the inventory at all times

Customer

Berner Oberland Bahnen AG is a Swiss railroad company running train services between Interlaken and Grindelwald as well as Interlaken and Lauterbrunnen. The trains are maintained, serviced and repaired at the company’s own workshop in Zweilütschinen. Having replaced their trains – which also involved modernizing the facilities and finding additional storage space for spare parts – the company opted for the integration of automatic storage systems from Kardex Remstar.

Task definition

Before the modernization measures, the company’s static shelving was located in a basement room and thus outside the working zone for servicing, maintenance and inspection, which meant the employees had to walk long distances. In the course of replacing the trains, the workshop was enlarged and modernized. In addition, the ageing storeroom was needed for a different purpose. This called for a fundamental restructuring of the warehouse.

Solution

In a fi rst step, Berner Oberland Bahnen AG installed two Kardex Remstar Shuttle XP 500 units in combination with Power Pick Global warehouse
management software in order to reduce the distance traveled by employees and to increase the picking speed of the individual items. Twoadditional Shuttle XP 500 units followed two years later. “By this time, we already knew two Shuttle XP 500 units wouldn’t be enough for all of our items. Knowing we could expand the system at any time gave us the necessary buffer and time to get ourselves organized before increasing our storage capacity at the right time,” says Thomas Blatter, workshop manager at Berner Oberland Bahnen AG. “Thanks to the fact the warehouse is close to the working zone and employees are able to access it at any time of the day – which makes it possible to work without a warehouse manager – the investment in this modern storage solution has been very profitable.”

Scope of delivery

• 4 Shuttle XP 500 units (W x D x H: 2,780 x 2,921 x 5,450 mm)
• Power Pick Global warehouse management software