Online Exclusive Case Study: Engineering the Perfect Fit

One of the hottest commodities today is space. Throughout the world, manufacturing, warehouse, office and even living space are scarce. As a result, business owners are looking for better ways to maximize the space they already have.

Fort Atkinson, Wis.-based Spacesaver Corp. helps companies use storage space efficiently and cost effectively. Since 1972, the company has developed customizable storage systems for documents and other materials. In 2007, Spacesaver introduced the XTend mobile high-bay storage system for high-density, off-site storage, enabling businesses to archive large volumes of materials in off-site facilities and use on-site space for more profitable purposes. Raymond Corp. played a key role in the development of the system by providing input on how to integrate mobile racking with electric lift trucks.

“We did extensive market research before designing the XTend system,” says Chris Batterman, product manager of high-density mobile products for Spacesaver. “In speaking with our customers, we found that Raymond lift trucks were the lift trucks of choice in existing static installations. Raymond is the market leader among the types of off-site storage applications we were studying for the narrow-aisle mobile storage system, and so we decided to work with Raymond initially in our development.”

The XTend system is designed for low-pick applications, such as those in academic libraries, government record centers or police evidence storage warehouses. Because many of the items spend years in storage, it’s important that the storage system protects the integrity of valuable material, while also allowing easy access for picking and putaway.

High-density mobile storage can double storage capacity when compared with fixed shelving. In a mobile storage system, shelving is mounted on wheeled carriages that run on tracks. The shelving units compact together, eliminating the aisle space between shelves and reducing the overall space required for the entire shelving system. When a particular aisle needs to be accessed, a user moves the carriages to open the required aisle. For example, the XTend system’s carriages are moved by DC motors activated by remote control or by pushing buttons on a stanchion at the end of the aisle.

Spacesaver’s XTend system is the first mobile high-bay storage system to feature very-narrow aisles. Because the carriages in a mobile storage system can be more than 100 feet long and up to 45 feet high, materials are typically retrieved by orderpickers. However, because the XTend system’s aisles are so narrow, Spacesaver needed to integrate a wire guidance system for the lift truck to keep it traveling down the center of the aisle and avoid impacts with the shelving unit.

However, integrating a wire guidance system posed an engineering challenge. The tracks that enable the carriages to open and close run perpendicular to the carriages. A lift truck’s wire guidance system runs parallel to the carriages, down the center of an aisle, and perpendicular to the tracks. Spacesaver needed a solution that would accommodate the rails without negatively impacting the lift truck’s ability to lock on the wire guidance system.

Spacesaver turned to Stoffel Equipment Co. Inc., an authorized Raymond service center in Milwaukee, for assistance. Spacesaver engineers and Stoffel representatives created several rail designs that could accommodate the wire, and Stoffel provided a Raymond orderpicker to conduct tests. Spacesaver engineers created tests using the rail designs with the Raymond intelliguide wire guidance system in the Spacesaver facility to determine the best method for accommodating the wire guidance system without interfering with the lift truck’s ability to lock on the wire.