Cimcorp bags Qingdao Sentury Tire deal

ERJ staff report (TP)

Ulvila, Finland – Qingdao Sentury Tyre has commissioned Cimcorp to provide the turnkey delivery of a new material handling solution for PCR green tires.

The system is due to become operational in steps in 2014-2015.

The automation system is based on Cimcorp's ‘Dream Factory solution’ and includes green tire handling from tire-building machines to curing presses.

Cimcorp said its buffer storage between these process phases as well as the advanced warehouse control software will “increase the efficiency” of the green tire area of the new factory.

Cimcorp Oy is a Finnish company specialising in material handling and intralogistics automation using robotics and advanced software technologies. It has 280 employees and has delivered 2,000 robotic systems across five continents.

Qingdao Sentury Tire Co. Ltd, based in China, started mass production in 2009 and was principally engaged in passenger tires and aircraft tires. Sentury's facilities cover an area of 9.6 million square feet (89,190 square metres) with an annual capacity of nine million tires in 2013.

Sentury said: "The whole project is designed into three phases: the first phase (2009-2014) will see 15 million annual capacity in passenger tires and 80,000 aircraft tires. The second phase (2015-2018) will see another 18 million annual capacity.

"Sentury will reach 50 million annual capacity after the third phase (2019-2022), which includes a full range of summer and winter tires for PCR, UHP, SUV, CUV, LTR, VAN, A/T and M/T, as well as aircraft tires."