Pallet Inverters

Broadly speaking you could say that any company who handles their product on pallets has a potential need for a Pallet Inverter.

Generally, customers can be broken down into 4 categories, one of these being to recover broken pallets or damaged goods at the bottom of a stack. It is fair to say that almost every inverter ever sold has at some time been used to give quick access to the bottom of the stack; many of them for only that purpose. Good housekeeping and better presentation to customers are two good reasons to have a pallet transfer device available at short notice when product starts to spill.

The biggest users of inverters are undoubtedly food and pharmaceutical companies who need to switch incoming goods from wooden to hygienic pallets for use in production areas. This principally applies to factories who manufacture products with a wide range of ingredients e.g. biscuits, cakes, snack foods, ready meals, health foods etc. Often the packaging material as well as the foodstuffs have to be transferred.

Hygiene is becoming increasingly critical and it is now out of the question for a wood pallet which could harbour any amount of chemicals or contamination from previous uses, to be allowed into a clean zone.

Any company that runs a high-bay warehouse or coldstore will be aware of the dangers of racking a broken or unstable pallet. Therefore, inverters are also used to guard against sub-standard pallets entering the system where they can cause delays or accidents.

The same hygiene and safety-conscious companies who employ an inverter on the incoming side of their operation may also use one for outgoing goods too.

Pharmaceutical products in particular are often palletised on plastic or other top quality skids in the factory but are switched to cheaper expendable pallets for distribution. A pallet transfer device gives the option to put goods on to the most suitable type of unit for distribution immediately prior to shipping. A producer may not know the destination of the goods at time of production, but now has the flexibility to transfer them to the most suitable pallet for the market concerned.

The fourth category of pallet inverter user is the company who simply needs to turn something through 180 degrees. There are many examples:

* Printers who need to print on both sides of the sheet of paper.
* Producers of laminated product such as MDF board.
* Cheese producers during the maturation process.
* Vineyards will allow the cork to expand in the neck of the bottles then turn them through 180 degrees for long term storage.
* Concrete sections can be inverted to remove the steel mould.
* Bananas are turned after ripening for better presentation in the supermarket.

Just when we think we have heard every reason for 180 degree inversion, our customers will come up with one more.