An ongoing proactive approach to forklift fleet safety at its Australian sites continues to pay dividends for leading food processing company Simplot Australia, which now has one of the country’s most advanced vehicle control and monitoring systems driving fleet performance and operator safety levels to new heights.

The Hawkeye system, supplied by forklift provider National Fleet Network and developed by Western Australian company Remote Control Technologies (RCT),  is now running on about 80 forklifts in New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania.

The system is built on RCT’s SmarTrack technology and includes GPS-based vehicle tracking and monitoring, and a web-based operations reporting system.

Simplot supply chain process improvement manager Graham Bryant said Hawkeye had enhanced operator safety and vehicle utilisation, and reduced levels of minor forklift and yard damage.

“We had been using a forklift safety system, which was our first venture into forklift safety management systems, and while it was a good and innovative product we wanted a more robust system with enhanced features,” he said.

“When our team started negotiations two years ago with major providers of forklift equipment, part of our requirement was for a forklift safety software package. Our team’s decision to continue with NFN and include Hawkeye was based on commercial terms and a history of good service previously experienced with NFN, and just as importantly our belief that Hawkeye would perform the tasks we expected in a robust and reliable way.”

Twelve months after introducing the new forklift safety system, a range of significant benefits have emerged.

Automated GPS tracking and monitoring, and the web-based reporting mechanism, had obviated previous machine-based software “gremlins”, Bryant said.

“The fact that it’s web-based reduces all the issues with loading up initially and upgrading software across all sites – it just takes away added complexity.

“The ability to run reports and see how well the machine is utilised is also a benefit as it allows the site logistics team to ensure unit workloads are balanced,” he said.

The Hawkeye/SmarTrack technology builds advanced safety features into each forklift. Dual-speed control via GPS sees vehicle speed regulated according to the unit’s position outside or inside buildings, while operators can’t start the vehicle unless they are seated with seat belt fastened, the handbrake on, and their security number entered.

Bryant, who has been involved in fleet management and process improvement at Simplot for more than 10 years, said the he was impressed by the reliability of the technology.
 
“I don’t get phone calls from people saying we’ve got a problem with Hawkeye,” he said. “In selecting the new forklift fleet, Simplot’s selection team had the choice of both a range of forklift providers and a range of safety software. We set up strict performance criteria and the selection process for our safety software was extensive to the point that we visited the short-listed providers and viewed demonstrations of the software under operating scenarios.

“What we like about RCT is that they’ve got a good reputation in the mining safety industry and a long history of managing safety systems in that very demanding mining environment. There are no second chances in the mining industry and so the reliability of the product, and of the support, is obviously vital. Knowing that they’ve got that product development history and backup we could see that they had the right stuff to support us with our application,” he said.

Remote Control Technology industrial business development manager Dave Holman said the company had been the dominant supplier of remote control systems to mines in Australasia and South East Asia for more than a decade.

It also specialises in manufacturing electronic protection devices for key heavy vehicle components, electrical and electronic equipment, lighting systems, and vehicle tracking and data management technology.

“All of our products are designed and built to withstand the rigors of fairly heavy mining type applications, so they are highly robust in that sense,” Holman said. “That robustness must translate into reliability when the product is fitted to a machine.

“Our system ... hasn’t had a failure yet and that’s after 12 months of operation. We also looked at the ways other suppliers were reporting data and some used radios while some were manually downloading data off machines. We could see a need to automate that process and the web-based reporting medium was also ideal.”

The system enabled Simplot to track forklift activity in a number of ways, from mobile and stationary running time through to driver hours.

Bryant said its safety features were especially important, as protecting drivers and pedestrian traffic was the overriding priority.

“We can have it set up so that if the forklift has a certain level of impact it will shut down. If there is a problem we know about it straight away; we can investigate the cause and put a robust solution in place,” he said.

“Obviously we don’t want to have that situation occur, and the zone speed limiting helps us reduce the risk of accidents involving the driver or pedestrians, or assets.

“Since running with Hawkeye we have noticed a reduction in minor damage in and around the area of operation, as well as to the units themselves.”

For more information contact RCT on (08) 9353 6577, email sales@rct.net.au or visit www.rct.net.au.

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