Street Cranes boosts productivity at £19m robotics factory

Fanuc builds around 6,000 robots, 125,000 servomotors, 84,000 servo amplifiers, and 25,000 CNC controllers every month to serve the wave of demand from manufacturers looking to become smarter and more automated.

Its new £19m cutting-edge facility has brought the company’s robotics, machine tools and factory automation activities under one roof; and includes design, manufacturing and training facilities together with offices and a large showroom area.

Street Cranes has supplied three double-girder cranes as part of the facility’s 48,000 sqft workshop, which retrofits, assembles and tests industrial robots, CNC machines, and turnkey automation systems.

Radio remote controlled, the cranes have a lifting capacity of 20 tonnes and are used for the loading and unloading of vehicles, moving machines around the workshop area and assisting with assembling and disassembling of equipment.

Street Crane’s Chris Lindley-Smith explained: “As we were involved during the early stages of this project, we provided all the up-front consultation work to the building and steelwork contractors, including budgets, crane design dimensions, and structural loading information. This detail was then factored into the facility’s construction programme and resulted in the cranes being installed more quickly, efficiently and cost effectively.

“Now fully commissioned, the cranes offer Fanuc safe and efficient lifting as well as very durable equipment which will meet the company’s changing needs. This durability is a result of Street’s ZX wire rope hoists which have been designed to significantly enhance safety, reliability and maintainability.”