Case study
OXFORD BODLEIAN LIBRARY
Item Products are proud to supply injection moulded tray handles for the Book Storage Facility (BSF) of The Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford.
Item Products (NPD) Ltd were thrilled to play a part in a huge project to relocate 8 million volumes to a purpose built, airconditioned, book storage facility based on a 15-acre site in South Marston, near Swindon for the world famous Oxford University Bobleian Library. The Bodleian was in need of a high-density book storage facility to provide essential space and better protection for its collections. As the Bodleian is a legal deposit library, its collections are gowing by approximately 170,000 volumes per annum, which requires an additional three miles of shelving every year. The Book Storage Facility (BSF) statistics are remarkable. There are 31 aisles, each 71 metres long and 11.4 metres high. They provide a staggering 247,000 linear metres (153.5 miles) of shelving that nets out at 10,052 square metres of book storage.
For Item Products, the project has not been without endeavour. Item Products Technical Director and owner Gerry Taylor said, "Our brief was to design a handle and support backing plate to fit a range of tray sizes and book weights of up to 20 kg. An unusual aspect of the project was the request for a fire retardant material and for the product to be assured for 50 years. Consequently we worked with a new material which will give strength and durability over time whilst blending the material to give a V2 (self-extinguish) fire retardant rating. Mr Taylor went on to say "the volume of handles required to feed the BSF build schedule kept one of our injection moulding machines running for months.
The pictures give an indication of the scale of the project.
RICOH CORNER POST EXTENSION
Ricoh UK Products Limited receives shipments of photocopiers produced by its sister business in Japan. The Telford plant adapts and configures these for the European market.
Ricoh operates a global environmental policy which includes, where possible, re-use of all packaging materials.
The modification undertaken at Telford increases the height of the Japanese product and as such the original transit packaging has to be modified to facilitate despatch.
In this circumstance, corner support sections were not of sufficient length to support the new height dimension of the finished copier. To source a replacement of appropriate height would have been costly and wasteful of the perfectly serviceable original post. Ricoh then considered the development of an extension piece which could then be fitted to the original post.
Item Products (NPD) Limited was already known to Ricoh as a designer and producer of innovative products for the packaging industry and was invited to present concepts for commercial, practical and environmental consideration.
Item Products were also prepared to work in accordance with the internationally applied Ricoh Green Procurement Policy and support the development by working within the confines of the environmental management system. The intention was to produce a component fit for purpose using materials of minimal environmental impact.
Product design began with existing Item Products components, which had been developed as solutions for associated problems, as a starting point. Two key phases of design resulted in SLA models for full evaluation by Ricoh leading to a decision to commission tooling for the unit, seen in photo, assembled to the original Japanese supporting post.
"For Ricoh, the development of environmental technologies is one of the most important aspects in sustainable environmental management. It is the basis for providing customers with products that simultaneously realise both a reduction in environmental impact and the creation of economic value.
As for our post extensions; jointly developing solutions like these with our suppliers extend the life cycle of our packaging, reduces our waste and saves on purchasing new posts – demonstrating that environmental impact reduction and bottom line benefits are synonymous".
RPL’s Environmental Officer
The post extension, produced from a reprocessed polymer, passed the Ricoh load-bearing tests and was successfully commissioned early 2008.
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