The authors Jouni Pitkäranta and Marjo Posio are robot barn functional design and troubleshooting consultants with 4dBarn Ltd Company.

4dBarn has made a field survey timing and following morning tasks in the robot barn. Our international data has over 70 barns (updated 2021) and it shows a huge variation in labor efficiency between farms, from 140 to 940 liters of milk/labor hour. There´s a lot of potentials to improve when we compare the amount of milk/labor hour or time consumption minutes per cow.
It is clear that just having an automatic milking system in a barn, doesn’t make it labor efficient or guarantee good milk production.

“Why does a cow barn need to be custom designed? Why can’t we just copy existing layouts?” These are questions we hear a lot. This survey convinced us that there really is a need for custom-made barn design. Farmers with similar-type barns worked in different ways, and the method of getting work done needs to be taken into account in the design phase. Planning ahead has a big influence on how efficient your barn will be. Instead of getting stuck on one design layout, it is important to challenge yourself to think more specifically about your farm before a single line is drawn on paper. Instead of running faster in a barn, let’s think how we can walk shorter

We in 4dBarn think of barn as a tool for milk production. Most important points in designing a functional tool are to ensure cow comfort and fluent cow flow together with good and efficient working routines. As with any tool, usage is in the hub. We know how an efficient robotic barn works and help our customers to get a perfect tool for their needs. 4dBarn® Designed concept can be adapted to any size of farms and we do functional design for new barns as well as existing barns converted to robotic milking. We work globally.

Read More:
https://hoards.com/article-24294-4dbarn-noticed-time-in-money-in-a-robot-barn.html

”Time is money in a robot barn”, an article written by Posio and Pitkäranta, Hoards Dairyman magazine 5/2016