Automated storage and retrieval (AS/R) Systems of the past: Why did they fail?
| Published date | 01 March 1990 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb047802 |
| Pages | 87-91 |
| Date | 01 March 1990 |
| Author | John Kountz |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management,Library & information science |
AUTOMATED STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL (AS/R)
SYSTEMS OF THE PAST:
WHY DID THEY FAIL?
John Kountz
Sidebar by JoAnne Hirsch
Since their public debuts in the 1960s,
thousands of automated storage and retrieval
(AS/R) systems have been installed in industrial
settings across the United States and Western
Europe. These units provide secure, controlled
storage and rapid retrieval for inventories that
range from computer components to major
sub-assemblies for fighter aircraft. However,
until the current installation of an AS/R at
California State University, Northridge, only
four previous installations were made in the
United States and one in Europe. All these
earlier systems experienced serious problems,
resulting in their removal at three libraries in
the U.S., with the remaining U.S. site currently
planning to remove its system. These failures
have conditioned librarians to avoid such
systems, despite significant differences in
contemporary technology. Kountz describes the
early systems and analyzes what went wrong
with them, and why.
Kountz is associate director, Library Affairs, Chancellor's
Office, California State University, Seal Beach, CA.
The forerunners of the modern Automatic Storage
and Retrieval System (AS/R system) were developed
following World War II in the late 1940s to handle
documents. Several companies were active in these
initial developments including the Remington Division
of Remington-Rand, Kenway, DeMag, and Supreme
Machinery. The novel and practical approach taken by
AS/R systems to store great masses of paper files in
minimum space coupled with the ability to retrieve
individual documents from those massive files more
quickly than possible with their human equivalents,
made them newsworthy.
Thus,
David Brinkley provided
national television exposure to the technique
as
it was
demonstrated at
a
business show in New York City in
the early 1960s. And, the technique was again the
subject of national television coverage in 1968 as
Walter Cronkite presented a working Randtriever set
up
in,
of all
places,
the American Library Association's
Annual Conference in Kansas City, Missouri.
Since these public debuts in the
1960s,
thousands
of AS/R systems have been installed in industrial
settings across the United States and Western Europe.
These units
provide secure, controlled storage and rapid
retrieval for inventories which range from intricate
electronic components (e.g.,
Tektronics,
ITT-Cannon,
etc.) to major sub-assemblies of busses and fighter
aircraft (e.g., Rapid Transit District of
the
City of Los
Angeles and the U.S. Naval Air Maintenance Depot
on
Coronado Island, San
Diego,
California, respective-
ly).
Until very recently, exposure to this technology
in libraries was limited to the five pioneer systems
—
AUTOMATED STORAGE
AND
RETRIEVAL
SYSTEMS
—
ISSUE 31 — (1990, NO.3) 87
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