BY TOBY GOOLEY, SENIOR EDITOR
BATTERIES AND CHARGERS
materialhandlingupdate
Many different factors can detract from lift truck battery performance—including a few you might not have thought of. Industry insiders tell us what to watch for.
Battery room confidential
PHOTO COURTES Y OF AEROVIRONMEN T INC.
IN SOME WAREHOUSES AND DCS, LIFT TRUCK BAT-
teries are taken for granted. Much like car batteries, they’re
treated as something that can essentially be ignored until
there’s a problem. But a lift truck battery is not a “set it and
forget it” piece of equipment. Rather, it’s a complex device
powered by electrochemical reactions; compromise the bat-
tery’s ability to efficiently produce those reactions and
you’ll diminish its performance and life span. Indeed, the
key to getting superior performance from a lift truck bat-
tery, says Harold Vanasse, vice president of sales and mar-
keting for battery management systems supplier
Philadelphia Scientific, is to understand the following fact:
“The laws of physics can’t be violated!”
Not everyone understands that, though. As a result, some
of the many factors that can detract from battery perform-
ance tend to get overlooked. Want to know what you may
be missing? Here’s advice from industry insiders on what to
watch for—including a few things you might never have
thought of.
▪ Temperature. Temperature—both high and low—has an
enormous impact on battery performance. As you might
expect, a battery can be destroyed if it should freeze. But
even moderately low battery temperatures will decrease
capacity. At 30 degrees F internal temperature, the available
battery capacity is reduced by roughly 30 percent, says Bill
