Energy management strategy development of a forklift with electric lifting device

The lifting system is controlled directly with an electric motor drive instead of pump. First, we analyzed the working condition and energy flows of the forklift and proposed an energy recovery system for forklift. Second, we built the system model including supercapacitor model, vehicle model and the simulation model in AMESim. Due to the markedly changing loads, supercapacitor with high specific power and high durability seems the best choice for energy storage system. In addition the study of rule-based energy management control strategies on forklift with electric lifting device is discussed, which is validated and evaluated by simulation. The results show that the fuel consumption of the forklift with electric lifting device can be reduced by about 46.72% compared with the hydraulic forklift and its transmission efficiency is improved 82.3% when the loads is 3t. The energy saving effect of electric system is very significant.