More and more customised industrial trucks
26 Mar 2015
Linde Material Handling records significant increase in tailor-made solutions
Over the past 10 years, no other industrial truck segment has experienced growth comparable to that seen in Customised Options, known as CO for short. While less than 20 percent of all industrial trucks left Linde Material Handling’s (MH) production plants with technical modifications back in 2004, this proportion rose to approximately a third last year. With dedicated CO teams in the factories and adapted production processes, Linde MH is well prepared for the trend towards an increasing share of tailor-made solutions.
“There has always been a certain share of customised versions, which is due to the fact that even with the large variety of products found in 85 Linde series and around 6,000 optional features, it is just not possible to meet all the specific individual requirements,” says Dr. Ralf Dingeldein, Vice President New Trucks at Linde MH. “What is new, however, is that customised vehicle solutions are being ordered more and more often to achieve further cost reductions through improved material flow.”
To be able to cope with the vast number of thousands of customised solutions annually, Linde MH has integrated the manufacture of these trucks into the series production process wherever possible. CO specialists accompany the process from order processing, design, development and procurement all the way through to manufacture, assembly, documentation and service, irrespective of the production plant in question. “Versatility, user friendliness, robustness and efficiency are the four major values of the Linde brand,” says Dingeldein. “And of course these apply to our customised solutions, too.”
All the more so because many of the developed COs are of interest also to other customer groups and thus make their way into series production. One example is the compact counterbalance pallet stacker Linde L06 AC AP.
This self-supporting vehicle, which can lift loads of up to 600 kg and is equipped with a stand-on platform, was developed for one of the world's largest furniture company. In order to operate more sustainably and reduce costs at the same time, the home furnishing giant switched over to pallets made of corrugated cardboard that are ten centimetres lower than the previously used wooden pallets.
Therefore it was no longer possible to use a standard pallet stacker. However, the counterbalance stacker Linde L06 AC AP offered the ideal solution. It combines the advantages of the counterbalance principle (cantilever forks) with very compact dimensions. With the ISO forks, it can lift any type of load carrier, including Euro pallets crossways, for example. And thanks to its shorter wheelbase and set back mast, this stacker with folding stand-on platform has a length of just over 2.4 meters.
“With this new customised solution, we open up a broad spectrum of applications, far beyond this individual case,” says Tobias Zierhut, Head of Product Marketing at Linde Material Handling, fully convinced. “Possible fields of application are found, for example, in production and assembly, or in warehouses with narrow aisles.”
