Quick change
March 1st 2005

Toyota Motor Manufacturing (UK) has worked with its materials handling supplier, Toyota Industrial Equipment, to establish two three-tier battery changing stations for forklifts at its Burnaston plant near Derby.

TMUK operates a just-intime production process in a plant where, every day, 1000 new cars drive off the production line.

The battery change system is designed to ensure maximum uptime for 94 Toyota electric 7FBMF forklifts and 150 tow tractors.

The sideways exit battery transfer on the forklifts means battery changeover takes about 3min and just one person is needed on each station. Safety too has been improved as the use of a magnet to extract and replace the batteries means there is no manual handling.

The new changing areas have eliminated damage to batteries and reduced damage to trucks.

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