Customer

The beneficiary of this Miles Data solution is a leading global provider of residential heating and air conditioning and commercial hvac solutions that reliably improve indoor environmental quality. The company provides energy efficient commercial air conditioners, chiller systems, hvac controls, hvac parts & supplies, and building automation systems that contribute to sustainable building design.

Challenge

Track un-painted compressor tanks which were currently being marked by hand with white chalk. The chalk marks were difficult to read, provided no image stability, and offered no opportunity for automatic data collection.
The goal was to provide a pressure sensitive label that could be printed on-demand at the production line and applied directly to the un-painted surface of a curved metal compressor. The label would be expected to adhere to the compressor as it passed through several paint stages including: a rigorous paint preparation process, a powder coated paint process, and an oven drying cycle. It was imperative that the label adhere to the compressor through the entire process as stray labels could potentially clog various draining mechanisms. Because the label would often be applied only seven minutes prior to the paint preparation process, the application required an aggressive, quick set adhesive.

Solution

After an initial phone consultation to review the application, an on-site visit provided an in-depth look into the current system and the desired outcomes of a re-design. Several synthetic label materials and thermal transfer ribbon formulas were tested. The materials that helped meet all criteria were a white polyester label facestock with high-tack permanent adhesive combined with Miles Data ribbon formula AE428 and Zebra 105 model printers. Each label was printed on demand on the production floor and included a 7 digit number (human readable from 8 feet away) and encoded as 2D Data Matrix symbol for auto tracking.

Results

The benefits of the new marking system are numerous. Compressor tanks are tracked efficiently and accurately. Information is timely because of the ability to print on-demand on the production floor with a networked industrial thermal transfer printer. Loss of labels and information is virtually eliminated because of the durable face stock, aggressive adhesive and durable ribbon formulation. Encoding the 7 digit numbers as a 2D Data Matrix symbology requires less space on the label and allows for automatic data collection resulting in fewer errors and enhances employee productivity.