Analyze This: Motive-Power Batteries in the Warehouse

If batteries could talk, what stories they could tell. While talking batteries are not currently available, powerful battery-analysis systems have emerged that reveal important usage data that is proving to be more valuable than the anecdotal and often incomplete information received from the operators of lift trucks, tuggers and pallet jacks.

Acting as impartial truth detectors, the analytical systems supply facts so that warehouse and logistics managers can use this data to improve operations through decreased battery expenditures, better targeted equipment maintenance and more efficient operator practices. On a larger scale, comparisons can be made between facilities, opening the door to improving operations on an organization-wide basis.

“Our battery management software has single handedly reduced the amount of batteries that we have to keep,” says Jay Johnson, a facilities service manager for Americold Logistics, an Atlanta-based provider of temperature-controlled food distribution services, handling over 60 billion pounds of product annually. “Now we get the same amount of work in a day with just two batteries, where we used to require three.”

Millions at Stake

The challenges faced by Johnson at his half-million square-foot facility in Fort Worth, Texas, mirror those of other warehouse managers and executives: how to best manage motive-power assets. This is a significant concern, as a large grocery distribution center or major chain store warehouse may have as much as $10 million tied up in trucks, batteries and chargers.

With batteries costing as much as five figures each, even a smaller material handling or warehouse operation can waste significant amounts of money through poor battery-room management practices. For example, while a lift truck battery is designed to give a steady performance of good run times for about five years, without proper tracking and maintenance, this rarely occurs.

Relying on inaccurate manual monitoring of battery usage, some logistics managers opt to just throw money at the problem. They buy more batteries than they need and use poorly performing ones longer then they should, wasting electricity — and money — in the charging process. Even more detrimental is the fact that underperforming batteries can slow the entire site's operation.

“Our facility is so big that the long distances the lift trucks have to travel can run down the batteries quickly; if they're unloading a trailer at the far end they could require a battery change before they finish removing the pallets,” explains Johnson. “Unless you know the health of the battery, this will happen, especially after the batteries get old. It could slow down the whole logistics train if a truck is held up because of a dead battery on a lift truck.”

Data Points

Four aspects of motive power have an impact on performance: the battery, the battery charger, the lift truck and the operator. Determining where the fault lies has traditionally proven difficult when relying on manual records that are subject to error and often incomplete.

In recognizing these shortcomings, many material handling executives are opting for battery analysis tools that employ software to precisely monitor battery performance. Interrogative in nature, these new systems provide valuable information to managers that allows them to improve efficiencies.

“We get several different reports via the system that we use,” continues Johnson. “It provides the information we need so that we can rotate the batteries more quickly and extract more work from them.”