While you typically can’t see it, it’s an integral part of a Raymond Carolina Handling forklift. And it’s essential for the creation and maintenance of a positive customer experience.
Using the same approach applied to power maintenance programs for customers, Carolina Handling operates an in-house battery maintenance program to help ensure the uptime and reliability of rental units.
With the largest rental fleet of narrow aisle forklifts in the Southeast, Carolina Handling maintains equipment to manufacturer specifications, prepped by Raymond certified technicians. And because motive power is essential to electric forklift uptime, Carolina Handling power management specialists focus on the care and maintenance of forklift batteries headed to the field for rental use.
“At one point, we were having issues with batteries on our rental equipment, and it was creating a poor customer experience,” said Distribution Supervisor Harman Rutledge. “The immediate thought was that the batteries weren’t properly charged.”
But after implementing a process to fully charge 20 to 30 batteries each day and properly identify them for distribution in the field, the problem persisted.
The next step was a lesson on lead acid batteries, learning the specifics about how lead plates immersed in sulfuric acid react chemically to generate electricity when a current is drawn.
More importantly was the lesson on sulfation.
“When sulfate builds up on the lead plates, it will not take charge in that portion of the battery,” Rutledge explained. “When you charge a three-year-old battery, there is three years’ worth of sulfate built up inside, so you’re only charging the bottom portion of the plate.”
De-sulfation is key
The typical lifespan of a lead acid battery is five to eight years. But like most things, the true lifespan depends on how well it is maintained. Keeping a lead-acid battery watered is critical. And making sure there is no buildup of lead sulfate crystals on the battery plates is key, according to Rutledge.
That’s why today, every battery that comes from the field into the Carolina Handling Rental department goes through an 18-hour de-sulfation process.
During de-sulfation, a charger emits a high-voltage, high-frequency, low amp pulse into the battery. The pulse knocks the sulfate deposits from the battery's lead plates and returns them to the battery acid.
In addition to de-sulfation, power management technicians test each battery to determine its specific gravity.
Due to chemical reactions during discharge, the specific gravity (density) of the sulfuric acid electrolyte decreases.
Knowing the specific gravity of the electrolyte, or sulfuric acid, in a lead-acid battery, gives insight into the level of charge. The specific gravity of a fully charged lead-acid battery should be somewhere between 1.265 and 1.285.
Scheduled maintenance on batteries boosts uptime, reliability
Battery system maintenance is equally as important as scheduled maintenance of brakes, tires and hoses. A proactive plan to manage motive power is a critical component in maximizing the lifetime of assets.
Research shows that preventive methods are better at boosting uptime and keeping production running rather than reactive maintenance performed after equipment has broken.
According to a study conducted by Forbes, unplanned downtime costs industrial manufacturers as much as $50 billion a year, with 82 percent of companies reporting at least one unplanned downtime incident over the past three years.
Below are some pro tips from Carolina Handling Power Management Technicians on proper care and maintenance of forklift batteries:
- Implement a process for watering batteries, ideally after every charge
- Visually inspect the plastic housing and cables of forklift battery connectors for breaks, cracks, cuts or frays before charging. Knotting, for example, is an indication of intense heat that could be caused by a malfunctioning water valve.
- Disconnect the lift truck battery at the end of each shift to preserve its charge
- Never let the charge drop below 35 percent
Learn more in this video, Battery Care & Maintenance, from Carolina Handling.
