Linde Hungary

Alongside its purchasing option for new and used devices, the Hungarian sub-sidiary of the forklift truck manufacturer Linde also offers a rental option. The rental fleet consists of approximately 1,500 forklift trucks, almost 1,000 of which are electric powered and for this Linde Hungary uses more than 1,500 24V, 48V and 80V batteries with various capacities.

Maintenance of the 230 forklift trucks in the short-term rental fleet, which predominantly run on batteries, is especially demanding. The equipment has to work perfectly and be ready for use again as soon as possible – often within 24 hours. An important factor in terms of availability is the batteries – these were often not fully charged, or became damaged by overcharging.

Fronius installed a Switch Box system at Linde Hungary for charging the rental forklift truck batteries. This allows up to ten batteries to be charged in succession using just one Selectiva charger. The connected rechargeable batte-ries receive the exact charge that they need and can no longer self-discharge before they are next used. This extends their service life and significantly im-proves the availability of the fleet. Furthermore, Linde Hungary only needs four battery charging systems for all battery types, which has reduced invest-ment costs considerably.