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Issue Date: February 2001

AllyCAD enhances warehousing design

February 2001

AllyCAD, the well known local CAD solution from Allyson Lawless, has found itself in yet another new market. It has been used to design a variety of structures over the past 17 years, not least of these being house layouts, shopping centres, office blocks and factories. ILS has now extended this to the design of warehousing.

ILS (Industrial Logistic Systems) is a logistics, supply chain and facilities planning consultancy. The company's main function is to develop logistics and supply chain solutions for clients throughout South Africa through its offices in Cape Town and Johannesburg. Over the past 15 years ILS has been responsible for the development of in excess of 300 warehousing and distribution facilities and associated networks in South Africa. Its clients include many of the `who's who' of the South African industry and ILS has worked for almost `anybody' who has a major warehousing and distribution operation.
ILS has been using AllyCAD extensively to optimise operations in supply chains by developing the logistics and facilities (warehousing and distribution). Unlike most 'pure engineering' companies, ILS tends to focus its use of CAD on the development of sketch plans, flow diagrams, concept designs and facility planning layouts. Its functions include very little detailed engineering design. Most of ILS's CAD station output is thus on the development and the selling of concepts rather than detailed engineering. Much of the use of CAD is also to communicate ideas and concepts to other professionals (architects, civil engineers, etc).
Major projects have recently been completed for Shoprite and Clicks. Other major clients include Toyota, Shatterpruff, Beacon, Home Choice, Simba, Adcock Ingram and the Botswana Department of Health.
For both the Shoprite and Clicks warehousing projects, ILS has used AllyCAD from the initial site layout and concept through to the detailed engineering drawings. This has made for quick and accurate visualisation of concepts which the clients have then been able to perceive and understand. AllyCAD, through its handling of multiple file formats, was also used to create the basis of the input for other professionals, to develop the building infrastructure and thus speeded up the design and implementation process.
The Shoprite Brackenfell project in the Western Cape, entailed the development of the logistics and supply chain and the ongoing development of the infrastructure. It is the largest distribution centre in the southern hemisphere and comprises 50 000 m2 of ambient storage, 8000 m2 of perishable and 2500 m2 of services and will handle a throughput of Ā±1 500 000 cases per week. Drawings were developed of the facility and these drawings were then passed on to all professionals, who used the base drawings to develop detailed engineering designs. The detailed engineering designs were then passed back to ILS which then used AllyCAD to develop the internal layouts, facilities planning and materials flow. This facility was then built and commissioned and is perhaps the most cost-effective warehousing operation in the southern hemisphere. ILS is also currently designing the Gauteng infrastructure for Shoprite - over 100 000 m2.
For Clicks, ILS developed the national network for distribution. This included 12 000 m2 with automated high-rise warehousing in Cape Town, 14 000 m2 in Durban and 32 000 m2 currently under construction in Centurion.
ILS's responsibility for these projects included site development, conceptual and detailed layouts, flow diagrams, operation flow interfaces, detailed design for tender and the purchase of equipment, as well as xyz coordinates for the input of the information into the computer systems.
At ILS, all staff are taught to use CAD. There are no dedicated draftsman and each engineer that undertakes consulting is expected to do his/her own drawing.
"We find that the AllyCAD system is simple to teach and a designer/engineer can be taught to be fully competent (without previous CAD experience) within three to four weeks," says Gary Benatar, Executive Director of ILS. "AllyCAD's ease of use and file handling capacity has contributed to the success of our major projects."
Allyson Lawless
(011) 476 4100


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