Articulated Forklift

Articulated Forklift

This master thesis has been performed at The Division of Fluid and Mechatronics Systems. The project was initialized at Toyota Material Handling Europe to investigate the possibility of improvements to the hydraulic system of an articulated forklift. The project work was performed at the Toyota Material Handling site in Mjölby. The goal of this project was to build a simulation model over the steering system and by using a simulation tool and measurements to evaluate possible improvements and solutions. It was also an opportunity to show the strength of using simulation programs during system design and analysis.

A simulation model was developed in the program Hopsan to analyze the different concepts and ideas. The model was built with a focus on the hydraulic steering system and a simplified mechanical model was implemented. To get the model as similar to the forklift as possible validation of the model was necessary. The validation data was collected by measurements on the forklift during short
tests. Data of pressure levels, motor speed and signals were, among others, measured during the tests. The tests were performed in Mjölby at the Material Handlings test site. More detailed information about the valves, accumulator and other components was collected from drawings and characteristic data from manufactures