Food Logistics serves the entire food supply chain industry with targeted content for manufacturers, retailers, and distributors.
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40 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2015 • FOOD LOGISTICS www.foodlogistics.com popular in Europe but are just starting to gain popularity in North America. "The overall industry trend is loads are getting heavier, yet they want to maintain their skinny aisles, so they have to lift the bigger loads higher too," says Steve Rog- ers, senior product marketing consultant at MCFA. "The moving mast reach truck works differently, but when operators demo the truck, they think it's phenomenal that they no longer have to stand in the truck for eight hours a day." Most new lift trucks also feature all of the ergonomic comforts of new automobiles, including automotive-style driving pedals, hydraulic control levers and either power or hydrostatic steering to make the overall operation as smooth as possible to increase operator comfort. The power steering has become so advanced in many of today's new- est lift trucks that "they're getting so easy to drive it's like driving your car for an entire shift," according to Rogers. Unicarriers Americas has also seen an increase in interest in sit-down and center-rider lift truck models, especially since those models are designed to be more accommodating and customizable to fit unique operator sizes. "We've had a greater interest in our center riders because of the smoother ride and the increased suspension in the floorboard," says Mark Porwit, director of marketing and product management at Unicarriers Americas. "The step off height is the same on center riders. We're continu- ing to see more female pickers in our customers' opera- tions, which means not only customizable features due to physical size differences, but smoother man- ual features that reduce the effort required to operate the forklift." How do you take the idea of operator fatigue one step further? Don't even make them get up and down and in and out of a seat at all. "We've talked with our food and beverage customers, and the walking isn't just what fatigues operators dur- ing order picking, but the continuous step- ping off and on the truck," says Smith. So Crown intro- duced its QuickPick Remote system for low-level order pick- ing that allows opera- tors to advance the truck with the push of a wireless remote button to reduce the need to step onto the truck to advance it to the next pick location. Technology evolves for visibility Aside from the idea of keeping operators safe by letting them sit down or stand more comfortably, many of today's technological advances in lift trucks are driven by the working environment in narrow aisle warehouses that are adding rack- ing upwards to economize space. "Food and beverage are looking for a safe way to pick from second levels because they are trying to put more SKU numbers in smaller spaces, so they are going up versus out with their products," says Smith. This smaller-and-narrower trend plays right into the sweet spot for Landoll Corp., makers of the Bendi and Drexel narrow aisle forklifts headquar- tered in Topeka, Kan. Landoll will be showcasing a brand new high lift model at this year's ProMat 2015 that works in an aisle as narrow as 78 inches and can lift as high as 480 inches (40 feet). To handle these smaller spaces, not only are the truck designs slim and compact, but now the mast is getting smaller for better visibility. Most manufacturers have improved the visibility either by narrower design, by offsetting the mast away from the center of the operator, or even using design features like Crown's MonoLift mast. This mast actu- ally gets narrower the higher it goes. Yale Materials Handling Corp. took its Hi Vis mast design on new lift truck models one step further for safety by offering mast cylinder safety fuses to "prevent a raised mast from free-falling down in the event of a hoist hose rupture," according to Jay Costello, director of training. As a result of warehouse racking going up and not out, one of the newest featured designs on lift trucks is increased maximum lift heights and higher capacities. The lat- est models to leave the manufacturer are equipped to reach heights of 23.5 feet and higher. And heavy loads at elevated heights can bring obvious safety issues, which is why the use of sensor technology to safely navi- gate at the upper levels of the racking is start- ing to become less of a customized feature and more of a necessary safety requirement for operators and facility managers alike (see sidebar on page 38). "When you get up high, operators can quickly lose perspective of where the forks CALL FOR A FREE CATALOG 1-800-295-5510 uline.com SAME DA HIPPING OVER 30,000 ITEMS A OUR FINGERTIPS π SHIPPING SUPPL SPECIALISTS • An operator sits comfortably in a Jungheinrich ETV Series 1 lift truck. • Yale offers an impact monitor option on models that can sense the lift truck's movement. Image courtesy of Yale Materials Handling Corporation. Image courtesy of Jungheinrich.