Food manufacturer, Speedibake, recently selected Barloworld Handling as its sole materials handling supplier, and has taken delivery of a new fleet of Hyster warehouse and counterbalance lift trucks at its Bradford site. 

Speedibake is part of Allied Bakeries and produces a wide range of products including, garlic bread, plain baguettes, muffins, pies and tarts at the Bradford site.  Commenting on the new fleet, Mick Bartle, Warehouse Process Manager said “As Barloworld was providing us with such a reliable service at our Wakefield site, we took the decision to go with a single source supplier”.

The production operation runs 24 hours a day, 5 days a week with the materials handling fleet being used throughout the process, from delivery of ingredients through to dispatch of the finished product.

When ingredients arrive they are offloaded by a Hyster H2.0FTS-A, 2,000kg capacity, LPG powered lift truck, and put away in the ingredient store by an R1.4, 1400kg capacity reach truck. When required, the ingredients are then taken from the store by the R1.4 and transported to the process area by a P1.6, 1600kg capacity, powered pallet truck. 

Finished products are then taken to the palletising area where a J1.60XMT, 1,600kg capacity, electric counterbalance truck is used to place the pallets onto a conveyor that takes it through to the cold store.

Once in the cold store, which reaches -23ºc, the products are put away in adjustable racking by R2.0HD, 2,000kg capacity Hyster reach trucks, which are fitted with cameras and defined colour monitors to help the operator place pallets up to 10.5 metres high precisely in the racking and minimise product damage. The trucks are also fitted with a CD/Radio player and heated seats to reduce fatigue and enhance comfort for the operators. The reach trucks feature the new heavy duty Hyster mast, which has minimal sway, greatly reducing lateral deflection at height.

The finished products are then taken by the reach trucks to the dispatch area where they are loaded into Lorries by RP2.0N, 2,000kg capacity, ride-on powered pallet trucks. In a typical week over 8,000 pallets are handled in Bradford and 4,000 in Wakefield.

Barloworld Handling has provided added value to Speedibake’s operation through its fleet monitoring and Total Battery Management Services.  Each forklift is fitted with a truck monitoring system that detects damage as a result of impact, records the number of hours used, the operator’s identity (through controlled access systems) and the battery changing time.

To improve battery management, Barloworld implemented their Total Battery Management (TBM) solution.  “We have been able to reduce the time taken to change batteries and will be seeing a substantial reduction in our costs,” comments Mick Bartle. Barloworld’s TBM features four major benefits:

Macbat Regeneration:  The Hoppecke batteries can be regenerated to provide optimum performance throughout their contract life.

Trac Air Battery System: This provides an air circulation system that can reduce charging time, reduce emissions produced by charging by up to 75%, decrease the need to top up the battery to approximately once every 3 months, and allow opportunity charging without damaging the battery.

Side Extraction:  Hyster electric counterbalance and warehouse trucks can be specified with side battery extraction, which removes the risk of accidents caused by swinging loads and chains shorting the cells on top of the battery.

Cost Reduction: The most significant benefits are the increased safety and cost reduction that Total Battery Management brings.

Mick Bartle continues “We have been very impressed with the service and responsiveness of Barloworld and the professional manner in which the changeover to the new fleet was handled. They are also able to service other non-Hyster trucks that we still have on site, so we have agreed a full maintenance contract with Barloworld.”