Carer and Curtis Instruments, a partnership for efficiency

Recently Carer has collaborated with Curtis Instruments, a company that deals with integrated systems and solutions for electric or hybrid vehicles and equipment. The relationship between the two companies aims to improve efficiency in electric forklifts and return the same driving experience as an internal combustion truck: a challenge Carer accepted and won with the A/X forklift truck series.

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Curtis Instruments since 1960 is a manufacturer of integrated systems and solutions for electric or hybrid vehicles and equipment: integrated driving systems, vehicle instrumentation, controllers, charge monitoring, and hydraulic control systems. A state-of-the-art company, aiming to provide the highest industrial quality, reliability, high security standards and care for the environment.

For this reason, Curtis Instruments has been identified as the ideal partner to work on the new instrumentation and control systems of the A/X series of Carer electric forklifts, whose performances are comparable to those of internal combustion engines. The A / X series is specially designed for the use in outdoor applications, where up to now the tendency has been to favor combustion trucks.

To provide an high performance truck with competitive performances compared to those of internal combustion, Carer needed to provide high speeds, rapid acceleration, excellent ergonomics and the ability to lift heavy loads and operate under any weather condition. Above all, it was necessary to drastically improve the truck's autonomy to allow the operator to complete an eight-hour shift with a single battery charge.

In this, the contribution of Curtis Instruments has been decisive, enabling Carer to reduce energy consumption through various mechanical and energy management choices, such as the use of an electronic brake to recover part of the energy used to stop the truck. The high efficiency was also made possible by the frontal axle innovation, made up of two independent units.

Even from the point of view of safety and ergonomics, Curtis Instruments had an important role. In particular in innovations such as the front and rear camera display system, the control of operating parameters and the electronic braking system, designed to make the vehicle stop safer and more predictable. All this was made possible by programming the software through Curtis VCL, the company's vehicle control language.

Through the partnership with Curtis and a joint research, Carer has been able to improve the performance and efficiency of the electric forklift trucks, creating a high capacity machine that can return the same driving experience and productivity of an internal combustion truck. All with extremely limited design and development time: the A/X series has been developed within just one year, placing Carer firmly at the forefront in the innovation of electric forklifts.