A company with tradition
The company Dachziegelwerke Jungmeier GmbH& Co KG has been around for over 180 years. The company, which is still family-owned today, was founded in 1820 on a site in Straubing on which the Romans were already operating a field tile factory around the time of Christ's birth. 200 employees at the site ensure an annual production of around 50 million pieces. "We specialise exclusively in the production of clay roof tiles", reports Andreas Wals. "This means that around 15,000 roofs of detached and semi-detached houses can be covered safely, reliably and in an environmentally friendly manner."

Ten different basic models and a wide range of accessories are produced in five plants in Straubing with six assembly lines. "Our management recognised the signs of the times at an early stage and invested in the machinery so that today we produce according to the latest trade show state of the art and can hold our own against tough competition", says Andreas Wals.

Two robots are used to palletise the roof tiles. One robot arm picks up the tiles from the belt, rotates them 180° and then stacks them into packs of 8 or 10. This is done at a speed of 2 m/s. The travel is approx. 60 cm. The air is full of brick dust. "We have already used a number of energy chains from other manufacturers and also hose packages, but they have not proved their worth. Due to the extreme movement and the short cycle times, they are usually torn within a very short time. Added to this are the harsh operating conditions. In many cases, the cables were damaged, so that we had to start costly repairs", reports Andreas Wals."After installing the triflex® R, the service life of the two robots has at least tripled, so that the investment pays off for us in any case, both from a technical and economic point of view."

"We learned about the technical advantages of multidimensional energy supply at a trade fair in autumn 2004", says Andreas Wals. "And we immediately decided to give it a try. We have been using it since the beginning of 2005. During a test phase, we were able to convince ourselves of its advantages in our day-to-day operations."

During a visit on site in Straubing, the responsible igus®® employee, Oliver Köhler, gained an impression of the operating conditions. The chain length and the appropriate connections were determined. A generous payment term during the test phase rounded off the offer. Today, the Jungmeier company keeps the energy supply system with the corresponding connection elements on stock as operating equipment so that it can replace them if necessary or independently convert other robots at any time.