The European forklift market has not looked chirpier in some sectors since the pre-recession levels of 2008, according to Crown’s recently-released 10-page white paper* based on a survey of over 300 materials handling professionals, 71% of whom cited the need to drive down their costs as the biggest materials handling challenge facing their organisations.
BITA members seem guardedly supportive of that view, as expressed at their AGM on May 10th when reviewing the forklift truck market outlook. It seems that UK productivity is outstripping Germany and the US “and there is a clear willingness among customers to invest in forklifts,” according to a report presented at the AGM by BITA’s consultancy, Oxford Economics. “Manufacturers do have cash piles. What’s missing currently is a trade upswing that will lead to consumer confidence.” Even so, says the report, “we have increased our 2013 forecast on investment goods to 3% which is good when compared with other sectors and shows an upward revision from six months ago.” Looking forward at the forklift market the report says the warehouse sector is set to outperform the counterbalance truck market this year, with the growth in e-commerce a powerful driver. The latter market, it believes, will take another two years to return to pre-recession levels. So with such encouraging signs is now the time to take a fresh look at forklift automation?
The Crown report claims that many organisations are now wondering if it is the right time to move to forklift automation as “capital equipment budgets are finally returning to pre-2008 levels, and many fleets are overdue for an infusion of new trucks.” It is a hard one to call, and as mentioned earlier consumer confidence is key to investment intentions.
Truck automation has been around since the late 1970s in the form of AGVs but they found success mainly in manufacturing environments where the function was purely transport without lifting. They have not been widely used in warehousing because the warehouse environment presents challenges not found in manufacturing and some early adopters have been disappointed with the amount of support required to keep forklifts retrofitted with AGV technology. But that could change soon, according to Steve Richmond, director of Jungheinrich’s Systems and Projects division. “Britain’s manufacturing companies are driving the trend towards greater use of automated storage and handling systems,” he says. “Manufacturing companies have a much higher perception of automation because many manufacturing processes are highly automated and companies feel more comfortable with the technology and see automated storage and handling as a natural progression within their business. They want to automate from the production line to the loading bay.”
Forklift automation has made impressive progress in recent years but there are still some issues to be solved, especially on the need to build into the truck sensor technology where it will not be easily damaged and making one supplier responsible for everything so that no buck passing on problems can arise. The Crown report posits six questions that every organisation should address when deciding whether to move forward with the current forklift technology or wait for the technology to evolve.
Do we have an application that suits current forklift automation systems?
Do we need vehicles that can operate in manual and automatic mode?
Will new technology introduce any new safety issues? A safety audit is the first step in any automation project.
Is the environment ready for automation?
Who will assume service responsibility and what are their capabilities? Current generation systems often involve technologies from multiple companies.
Do we have the internal resources to support the project? Early adopters have discovered that more resources were needed to support forklift automation than were anticipated.
There may, however, be one issue that all parties with an interest in forklift automation dare not speak its name – union opposition. Back in the early 1980s Komatsu introduced a wire-guided, fully automatic forklift for warehouse work trialled by a certain brewery. It seemingly foundered on the rocks of union opposition.
*The state of forklift automation. Are we there yet?
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