ID code readers: System of reliability

Automated systems are vital for effective product tracking, writes DIDIER LACROIX*
THE US is facing a shortage of honey. According to Journal Sentinel Online (May 2013), consumers purchase around 400 million pounds annually but local producers are only able to supply 150 million pounds. Coupled with growing demand for low-cost products, this gives foreign businesses, especially China-based ones, an attractive opportunity for export business.

Honey from China however, could be mixed with sugar water or corn syrup, and has been found to contain antibiotics and pesticides, based on a report by Modern Farmer. To complicate things further, Chinese honey is often shipped to other countries where they are then relabelled for export. This is called transshipping, and allows the product to avoid import tariffs.

Amidst this “honey laundering”, Asian producers of genuine, untainted products can build their credibility in local and overseas markets. This is by adopting technology that supports track-and-trace, aided by 1-D barcodes and 2-D codes. By allowing products to be traced, manufacturers can assure overseas importers and consumers that the former originates from a legitimate source.

In China, a company operates a class 100,000 Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP) plant and manufactures a variety of maternal and child nutrition products. These include probiotic powdered drinks, baby and infant powdered milk, mother’s milk powder, and other nutritional and health products. The company has formed strategic partnerships with companies in Europe and US.

With its reputation at stake, the company required a sophisticated approach to detecting defects and ensuring product quality control. On the production line, the goal is to ensure that every packaged product has the correct serial number printed on it. Prior to deploying an automated ID reader system, the production line had to be halted whenever barcode errors or printing problems occurred and were discovered. This was so that corrections could be manually made in the barcoding process.

The problem with this approach was that it was inefficient and could not ensure the quality of product packaging. Because the human eye can become tired, substandard products could pass through the production line unchecked and undetected.

As there was an urgent need to address these quality control issues, the facility decided to implement an automated inspection system. The approach would be to collect and upload product data after the system completes its inspection.

Implementation decision
After testing several automated systems, the decision was made to adopt the In-Sight Micro vision system and and DataMan fixed mount ID readers. The vision system’s Optical Character Recognition (OCR) capability provides the accuracy in recognising characters whilst ID readers are able to reliably read the barcodes. The system also includes control and management software for the entire defect detection process.

The quality control system’s hardware and software work together to provide real-time monitoring and statistics collection on the production line. The security label is first attached to a product by the labelling machine before the serial number is printed by the laser coding system. The online recognition and control system then directs the ID readers to study the barcodes on the security labels.

As this is happening, the vision systems are directed to read the serial number on the product box. The software then compares the data that has been read by the cameras, with those from the barcodes printed by the laser coding system. Products that have recognitionShop Women's Boots