When competitors of Bollegraaf Recycling Machinery face insufficient production capacity they contract parts of installations out to others. When that happens, they often opt for Eastern Europe. This production method offers only short-term solutions for keeping a lid on production costs. Wages are rising in Eastern Europe, too. It doesn’t make delivery times any shorter, but it does offer a way of boosting sales. The time needed to complete the whole production process for a baler and an entire sorting system is often longer than customers expect these days. Therefore, Bollegraaf Recycling Machinery wants to reduce the amount of time taken to run through the production process. In this way, capacity can be increased, without delivery times becoming longer. With the same number of employees, Bollegraaf Recycling Machinery wants to boost production significantly.

On 20 March 2008, we reached the highest point of a new production hall where installations will be hanging from a monorail with several welding robots that can weld complete constructions of balers, conveyor belts and sorting systems. So the entire welding process at Bollegraaf Recycling Machinery will be automated. By making the production drawings three-dimensional, the welding robots can weld machines completely. The plate sections required to build the machines are cut fully automatically on two new fully automated plasma cutting machines. This means that cutting as well as welding can continue 24 hours a day. Cameras monitor the production process. The worker who is in charge of the monitoring can follow the production process on a display screen and can, if necessary, take action if there any problems. The steel plates are stored in the new production hall. The steel plates are given a red lead coating beforehand, and sandblasted so no further blasting will be required during later stages of the production process. This offers advantages aimed at an uninterrupted production process, but also for the preservation of the machines by priming them, and final painting. A fully automated plate bending machine has also been acquired. The cut plates can be bent into every desired shape. All new machines will be placed in the new production hall, which will be 150 metres long and 24 metres wide. A storage hall for used machines that have been traded in is also being built, with a length of 75 metres and a width of 18 metres.

The whole production process using plasma cutting machines and welding robots is unique for a manufacturing company making machines for the recycling industry. The competition is becoming increasingly fierce because of products from Eastern Europe, Asia and other countries with cheap labour. Bollegraaf Recycling Machinery is a company that builds quality machines. It wants to maintain this quality, but at the same time needs to reduce the costs of making the machines that it produces, so it becomes more competitive. In spite of the rising steel prices, Bollegraaf Recycling Machinery refuses to compromise on the quality/reliability and long lifespans of its machines. Delivery times of the machines that it will produce will be reduced.

The plasma cutters and welding robots will make it possible to cut production times of the machines by more than half. As a result, there will be smaller stocks on the production floor and it will be easy to switch from one type of baler to another without suffering longer delivery times. The new manufacturing hall including machines has to be operational by the end of 2008. From 2009, fully automated production will then take place in the hall. From then on, manual assembly will only be required to put together all components. In this way, Bollegraaf Recycling Machinery will be able to deal with the growth of the recycling market in the coming years.