Smurfit Kappa

With around 46,000 staff members and 370 production facilities in 35 countries, Smurfit Kappa produces and delivers a complete range of corrugated board and solid cardboard packaging for all industries. At the site in Eerbeek, the Netherlands, the focus is on the production of corrugated packaging from rolls of paper.

Until recently, to unload the heavy paper rolls Smurfit Kappa MNL Golfkarton used 7-tonne
Hyster® LPG lift trucks, but these were due for replacement. To support sustainability and
social responsibility the paper producer was looking for electric alternatives.

Four suppliers were invited to deliver a test truck. Smurfit Kappa was specifically looking for
a compact truck, and found that the 7-tonne test trucks had different dimensions and were
often too big to manouevre in the space available.

• To unload heavy paper reels, Hyster and local dealer Heffiq have provided compact and sustainable 5.5-tonne capacity electric trucks which deliver comparable performance as their 7-tonne predecessors.
• Hyster and Heffiq have delivered a unique variable spacer solution for the mast to enable the paper rolls to be unloaded from the middle of the loading floor to a lorry, overcoming the shift in load centre and reduction in residual capacity usually encountered

• The Hyster® J5.5XN trucks have a lift capacity of 5.5kg, at a
  loadcentre of 600mm, and a three-stage mast.
• “The 5.5T lift trucks are more compact and more manouevrable than the heavier predecessors. Consequently we can use our limited storage space even better. Furthermore, energy usage has been reduced, offering an attractive benefit to our cost of operation,” says Tonny Hinrichs, Team Manager Corrugated Board Machine at Smurfit Kappa.
• A variable spacer for the mast, in the shape of a pantograph, has been developed to enable paper rolls to be loaded onto a lorry using a 5.5T lift truck. The mast tilts forward while the carriage moves back, bridging the gap from the loading floor to the lorry, while keeping the clamp in the correct position to lift the roll.
• When the roll has been unloaded, the carriage and the mast return to their original position, so the rolls can seamlessly and safely be manouevered through the warehouse and stacked up to 6 metres.
• For additional stability, when picking up the paper roll with the forward tilted mast there is an extra counterweight below the battery.
• “For us this is the ultimate solution. The truck satisfies all our demands. It is sustainable, compact and efficient,” says Tonny Hinrichs, Team Manager Corrugated Board Machine at Smurfit Kappa.