10,000 Tons of Fizzy

Today we visited the Barrs Irn Bru factory in Cumbernauld as part of Doors Open Day. I don't drink Irn Bru as I've never liked it, but I'm always interested in the high-tech side of the manufacturing industry.

The plant was pretty impressive - they make a lot of Irn Bru there in an almost completely automated plant. Some parts process tens of thousands of cans or bottles each hour, and move faster than the eye can see.

This is "the stack", where pallets are stored in a rack system 16 across, and 14 high and 44 from front to back. That means it can hold nearly 10,000 pallets which can be over a ton each. That's a whole lot of fizzy juice! Four computer controlled cranes access the whole system without humans setting foot in there from week to week - people are only needed for occasional maintenance and repairs.