Earthquake resistant racking to increase the capacity of Sika Colombia’s distribution centre

• With 7 regional offices and 4 production plants, Sika Colombia is leader in the manufacture and marketing of construction chemicals.
• Sika Colombia entrusted AR Racking with increasing the storage capacity of its distribution centre in Tocancipá, in the Bogotá northern savannah.
• AR Racking replaced the existing racking with new ones while the warehouse remained operational.

Sika Colombia, subsidiary of the multinational corporation Grupo Sika and leader in the manufacture and distribution of chemicals for construction and industrial sectors, recently completed its warehouse renovation project in Tocancipá. “The overriding priority was to increase the storage capacity of our distribution centre at the Tocancipá plant, and renew our previous racking system due to completing its life-cycle, without this affecting the availability of the finished product and with the execution being transparent for our sales force, and most importantly without affecting customer deliveries. We were very satisfied with the execution of the project, which was carried out without any safety incidents and with minimum deviation from the implementation schedule, keeping in mind too, I should stress, that we completed it with the distribution centre in operation”, explained Andrés Felipe Cuellar, Head of Maintenance and Engineering at Sika Colombia.

“The replacement of all the racking that we had in the distribution centre warehouse, at the Sika Tocancipá plant, was a major challenge for everyone involved, with a lot of pressure applied in this respect from the different business units, as the operation could not be stopped. The project was executed with excellent results thanks to the integration and provision of the Sika and AR Racking engineering and logistics areas, to adapt to the logistics activity of the plant and to be able to disassemble and assemble the new racking with all the necessary technical and safety criteria. Additionally, with AR Racking a wide span shelving was developed and implemented, which was designed according to Sika’s market, increasing the storage percentage of finished product”, indicated Juliana Andrea Reyes, In House Project Engineer at Sika.

With more than 400 different products in the market, the Tocancipá distribution centre was equipped with selective pallet racking to store 1000 x 1200 mm pallets and also europallets. “The dismantling and installation process was a very interesting challenge as the warehouse was always full and with the operation running”, commented Edward Suescún, General Manager of AR Racking Colombia. The 3,500 m² distribution centre now has 4,686 positions, increasing its logistics capacity by 19.54%. The racking is also designed with an earthquake-resistant structural calculation, which means that the dynamic forces to minimise the risk of pallets falling during an earthquake have been considered.

In addition to being an adaptable logistics proposal to the dimensions of the unit loads, with adjustable pallet racking it is easy to quickly locate the pallet and access is direct and immediate. “With this project the storage capacity of the warehouse at the logistics centre has been increased. The change from double-deep to single-deep racking has impacted inventory, loading and preparation operational times, generating greater versatility for the handling and storage of different types of loads, resulting in FIFO product management efficiency and improvements in the warehouse.

The challenge also arose of managing the entire warehouse operation while creating new locations in the system, due to the change in the type of racking, carrying out all the physical movements necessary for all the installation work, so as not to lose the products being moved during the activity”, confirmed Jair Ospina Logistics Warehouse Manager at Sika Tocancipá. 7 regional offices, 4 production plants and more than 400 employees make it the leading reference in its sector. A commercial activity that has been continuously growing since the firm was created in Colombia in 1951, thanks to its commitment to innovation, quality and service.