Need a Lift?

By Eriez Manufacturing Co.

Family-owned and -operated since 1968, Brannon Steel has built a strong reputation as one of North America’s premier suppliers of carbon steel parts to print. The company provides parts to a broad array of industries, including off-road construction, railroad, agricultural, material handling, defense, energy, forestry and mining.

Brannon Steel’s 200,000-sq.-ft. facility in Brampton, Ontario, houses state-of-the-art manufacturing equipment, giving the capacity and redundancy to ensure an uninterrupted supply of parts. The company has become well known for its wide range of capabilities, such as beveling, flame cutting, high-definition plasma cutting, laser cutting, plasma bevel cutting, saw cutting, cleaning and packaging, forming and flattening.

The business is dedicated to quality and safety in all areas. This commitment includes selecting only the most advanced equipment and machinery for use at the facility. When the company needed a lift magnet for its plasma cutting table, management chose a Burn Table Full-Coverage Lift Magnet System from Eriez Manufacturing Co. in Erie, Pennsylvania. Purchaser Dave Lee of Brannon Steel said the powerful magnet has exceeded expectations since its installation in September 2018.

“Brannon Steel (had) been cutting strips out of a 60"×360" sheet of 3/16"-thick steel,” he said. “These strips (ranged) in widths from 6" to 12", usually almost the full 360" length. (We’d) been using Eriez APL lift magnets with great success for quite some time for most of our other cutting tables, but they weren’t really appropriate for this particular application due to the thin steel and long, flexible parts. We contacted the Eriez sales office to see what alternatives they may have, and they introduced us to their full-coverage system.”

Once the companies discussed installation requirements, operating procedures and safety benefits of the system, the full-coverage lift magnet was suited perfectly for the facility and operational needs. However, Brannon Steel’s due diligence didn’t stop there. The organization investigated other magnet system suppliers to determine whether any could provide a competitively priced system with the features and performance offered by Eriez Manufacturing.

Performance

“After more research, we decided to go forward with Eriez,” Lee said. “The past performance of Eriez’s smaller permanent lift magnets and history of stellar customer service gave us all the confidence we needed. We knew we would receive a quality product and solid local after-sales support from Eriez.”

When the new system arrived, it was integrated into crane controls.

“We started seeing the benefits almost immediately,” Lee said. “The operators were able to not only clear the cut parts off the table much more efficiently and safely, but they also loaded full sheets onto the table with the same performance.”

He explained that the lift magnet was a game changer in terms of improved safety and reduced labor requirements.

“Prior to installing the Eriez system,” Lee said, “parts removal involved two operators manually removing 350"-long strips of steel from the cutting table and stacking them on a long skid. The process was very labor-intensive and involved the operators often walking on the cutting table, which the management team wanted to avoid at any cost.”

The system enables operators to unload the long strips without having to climb onto the table. The magnet system also reduces the unload time of a 60"×360" sheet from 1.5 hours to about 15 minutes. This reduction adds incredible efficiency to the operation.

“We’ve more than quadrupled our output on this table as a result,” Lee said. “The Eriez system provides a huge time savings because we no longer need to manually remove the strips from the cutting table. This system was built specifically to fit the Brannon Steel application, but this style magnet has the versatility to handle a large variety of sheet and part sizes. Competitors we explored could not customize their systems to our exact needs as economically as Eriez did with their system. Our new system uses standard-designed components in an assembly that accommodates our steel sheet and part sizes. However, because the individual magnets can be rearranged, we can handle other applications if necessary.”

Safety and Quality

Brannon Steel’s size allows it to offer many customer advantages, including a 24-hour work cycle, direct mill buying privileges and the flexibility to respond quickly to the needs of customers. The company is highly committed to innovation and cultivates a culture that encourages creative solutions from all team members. Continual significant investments in the latest technology and a dedication to research and development-oriented projects keep the business on the leading edge.

This commitment to safety and quality is demonstrated through ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 certifications. The company also uses lean manufacturing and Six Sigma tools. In addition, Brannon Steel’s kanban, kitting and just-in-time programs are supported by fully integrated enterprise resource planning, electronic data interchange and bar coding capabilities to ensure tight quality control and tracking capabilities.

Burn Table Design

Moving numerous parts from a burn table can be a very time-consuming process. Eriez Manufacturing’s new air-operated Burn Table Full-Coverage Lift Magnet System utilizes a large, full-contact magnetic surface area to move multiple cut parts from the burn table in a single lift. The magnetic circuit design eliminates gaps on the surface, enabling the magnet to pick up skeletons as well.

Another benefit of the design is the ability to pick up single sheets of thinner material from a stack for table loading, down to a 3/16" sheet. This feature removes the need for spacers between individual sheets and adds efficiency to table loading as well. The full-coverage capabilities dispose of manual handling and the requirement for operators to climb on the table, resulting in safer, more efficient burn table operation.

Operation of the system requires only an overhead hoist and an air supply. The simple solenoid valve on the unit can wire into existing crane controls, whether it’s a wired pendant control or a hands-free radio control. The air source can be from shop air or a small, dedicated compressor mounted above on the crane bridge. The permanent magnet circuit gets rid of costly lift magnet controllers and safety concerns due to power failures. The system is also very energy-efficient, needing merely a small amount of air to cycle fully.