Belgian brewer uses robots to palletise its kegs

The Haacht Brewery in Boortmeerbeek, said to be Belgium's third largest brewery, has revealed it has been using Fanuc industrial robots for around six years to process, fill and palletise the heavy beer kegs it handles, following a decision made to modernise production.

Haacht processes 500 kegs an hour, predominantly for the catering sector, and has an annual output of around 1M hectolitres of beer.

The use of robots has increased output while lowering palletising maintenance costs.

In 2010, it installed three Fanuc robots. To visually inspect the beer kegs, a Fanuc R-2000iB robot was connected to a vision system via the robot controller.

Two Fanuc M-410 robots, which have a payload of up to 700kg, were also installed at the end of the line to palletise the filled kegs.

Since being installed, no robotic faults have been reported.

For more information, contact Fanuc UK.