Day: 25 February 2019

The risk of a delivery van’s floor suffering significant and costly damage during the loading process can be eliminated, says Paul Murray, JCB’s Teletruk general manager

According to a recent report by the Urban Transport Group, some 3.8 million vans (goods vehicles below 3.5 tonnes in weight including their cargo) are now registered in the UK. This figure reflects an increase of 74 per cent since  1996 – with vans now representing 15 per cent of all motor vehicle traffic.

A number of factors are thought to be driving this growth, including the ever-upward spiral of the online shopping market and the resultant need to deliver internet shoppers’ orders – particularly to those consumers living in the most densely populated conurbations.

For any logistics company, running a van fleet can be a costly exercise. Tax, fuel, maintenance and insurance, all add up to significant expenditure for any company, large or small, so its important that businesses do whatever they can to minimize these costs.

Clearly the aim of any fleet manager is to ensure that vehicles are off the road for the shortest period of time possible and, to this end, ongoing maintenance regimes and driver training programmes both play a key role in cutting the amount of time that vans are out-of-action.

However, perhaps surprisingly, one of the most common causes of lost van ‘up time’ is not an engine fault deriving from poor maintenance or damage resulting from reckless driving: it is bodywork damage inflicted by poor load handling and loading techniques.

In simple terms, when it comes to van loading it is common practice for a small counterbalanced truck or pallet truck to be used to lift a palletized load into the back of a vehicle. The pallet is then often ‘slid’ into the van’s storage space either manually or using the forks of the lift truck.

But, as many fleet operators have found to their cost, there is a significant likelihood that a wooden pallet (with the inevitable protruding metal fixings) that is slid into the back of a van will often rip into the vehicle’s flooring – causing significant damage that is both costly and time consuming to repair.

But more and more logistics operators and courier firms are eliminating this problem by introducing JCB’s Teletruk technology to their operations.

Thanks to its unique telescopic mast design, which gives a forward reach of 2.4 metres, the Teletruk can deliver a pallet to the far end of a delivery vehicle without touching the floor, until the pallet is gently lowered in to position. In this way, the Teletruk greatly reduces the risk of load and vehicle damage and, of course, eliminates the risk of injury associated with manually handling loads in to vehicles.

With today’s technology-enabled consumers demanding that their online orders arrive within hours of clicking the ‘buy now’ button, there will be no let up in the rise in the number of journeys delivery vans are required to make. So fleet managers are likely to find themselves under grater pressure than ever to keep their vans on the road and eliminating unnecessary damage during the loading process should be part of their planning.

Dutch intralogistics giant Vanderlande has signed a strategic partnership with Fizyr to develop artificial intelligence (AI) technology for its automated order picking, storage, unloading and palletizing robotic solutions. The results will be integrated into Vanderlande’s existing product portfolio, such as Smart Item Robotics (SIR), which has been designed to handle the large variety of items common to the warehouse, parcel and airports markets.

Fizyr is a Delft based company pivoted from Delft University that researches and develops ‘deep-learning’ computer vision software available from a box. This enables robots to process a broad selection of items through extended flexibility and improved handling capabilities, and allows companies to maximise their operational efficiency. For Vanderlande, the partnership will help to improve its existing robotics solutions like Smart Item Robotics as develop and introduce new robotics solutions within its markets.

“The use of robotics in the logistics industry is extremely complex due to the variety of goods being handled, for example in terms of the shape, size, colour and material,” explains Fizyr’s CEO Herbert ten Have. “By applying deep-learning technology software, we can identify the best grasp locations for a robot, allowing it to cope with a high level of variation.”

Vanderlande’s CTO Vincent Kwaks is excited about the future of this dynamic sector: “Deep learning is changing our landscape over the last years and multiple applications will benefit from these techniques. That’s why we’re delighted to be partnering with Fizyr to explore the potential for our robotics solutions and maybe other automation domains.”

“Fizyr is recognised as one of the leading technology companies in its field and this partnership demonstrates Vanderlande’s commitment to our customers, who look to us to create innovative solutions that help them to remain competitive.”