A tailor-made, 28-tonne rolling road has been designed and installed to test six aspects lift-and-reach trucks operation.

Cirrus Technologies of Redditch, England, has designed, installedand commissioned a tailor-made, 28-tonne rolling road forlift-and-reach trucks (telescopic handlers or telehandlers, withside-mounted engines) for Caterpillar (UK) at Desford,Leicestershire, a site which proudly holds the highestattainable, 6 Sigma manufacturing quality standard.

For more than75 years, Caterpillar has been building the World'sinfrastructure and, in partnership with its worldwide dealernetwork, is driving positive and sustainable change on everycontinent.

With 2002 sales and revenues of $20.15 billion,Caterpillar is a technology leader and the World's principalmanufacturer of construction and mining equipment, diesel andnatural gas engines and industrial gas turbines.

Caterpillarproducts and components are produced in 50 US facilities and in65 other locations in 23 countries around the globe (seewww.cat.com).

In the UK, the Building Construction ProductsDivision manufactures building construction equipment typicallyfor building sites and farms everywhere and is located at Desford(tel: 01455 826 826), whilst the Diversified Products Division atPeterlee, Durham, specialises in larger machines for the mining,quarrying and civil engineering sectors.

The Cirrus rolltestequipment tests Caterpillar's telehandlers, a range thatruns from 5 up to 15 tonnes.

The rolltest system accommodatesdifferent models and specifications of telehandler with maximumflexibility.

The rolling roads tests six aspects of eachtelehandler :- * Run-out speeds in each gear.

* Parking brake.

*Service (foot) brake.

* Differential lock.

* Dynamic run-out(i.e simulation of load carried).

* Uphill driving simulation.Cirrus' front-end interface talks to the resident controlsystem, which is the 'Test Manager' from VehicleMonitor Corporation (VMC) of Canada, the preferred supplier oftest equipment software for Caterpillar plants around the globe.'Total data capture' enables all data and reportsgenerated by the VMC system on individual vehicles to be archivedand accessed.

At the heart of the engineering are four 1.5mdiameter rollers (with one Siemens AC motor and one drive systemto each roller) and five hydraulic cylinders.

There are one suchcylinder per axle (two total) for vehicle centralizing andlateral restraint, one cylinder each for fore and aft vehiclerestraints (two total), plus another which positions thewheelbase.

The new rolling road has a unique restraint system,which is far stronger than that on a typical rolltest rig forautomobiles.

Lateral restraint is controlled from the inside ofthe vehicle track: it is accomplished by means of the hydrauliccylinders which centralize the vehicle during set-up and restrainit before and during test.

Innovative Cirrus thinking also solveda particular problem: when changing gear or braking, the testvehicle will rock, so Cirrus devised and implemented a newprinciple.

They designed a solution which allows the restraintrollers to move 3mm - 4mm with the vehicle, and this 'activedamping' provides all the cushioning needed.

What is more, aremote link via modem between the Cirrus HQ at Redditch and theprogrammable logic controller (plc) of the rolling road atCaterpillar reports on the status of the system in real time andis proving effective in tracking down the source of any problemthat may arise and in eradicating it.

Other important andinteresting features technically are :- * An environmentallyfriendly, regenerative, power-saving system.

* The safe andsecure booth enclosing the rolling road.

* A 2.2m deep pit whichhouses the workings of the rolling road and is easy to access ateither end by ladder for scheduled maintenance. 


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