Bendi becomes a museum piece
February 1st 2007 Translift Bendi has presented the earliest known example of a Bendi to the National Fork Truck Heritage Centre at the Midlands Railway Centre near Ripley Commenting on the presentation of the truck to the National fork Truck Heritage Centre, Translift MD, Simon Brown said: "We're delighted to be able to present this exhibit to the museum. It represents an important milestone in truck design and provides a demonstration of the ingenuity and resourcefulness of British engineering businesses." The first Bendis rolled off the production line in 1987 – the first articulated trucks of their kind available anywhere in the world. The truck presented to the museum was delivered to its original owner in 1990, making it the earliest known Bendi in existence, although the design had already undergone the first of many upgrades and enhancements. There had been earlier articulated truck concepts in the forties and fifties, but none had employed the combination of geometry, dynamics and weight distribution that provide the Bendi's unique stability and traction characteristics, developed by inventor Freddy Brown, father of Translift Bendi managing director, Simon. How the Bendi evolved Having previously pioneered the Man Rising Very Narrow Aisle (VNA) Turret truck in the 1960's and then the Narrow Aisle Rotareach in the 1977, Freddy found that by reversing the triangle of stability and changing the weight distribution he could make the articulated truck a truly versatile replacement for conventional counterbalance and reach trucks. With later developments, it equalled and eventually supersede the capabilities of traditional VNA machines. The major difficulty was ensuring that, during loading and extraction, and with the truck and load at ninety degrees to each other, the pallet must follow a path parallel to the sides of the pallet location. On the original Mark I, the pantograph mounted forks provided a solution, but were expensive to produce and detracted from the initial aim of simplicity. A more elegant solution was achieved by simply pointing the forks at the slots in the pallet and engaging the pallet while winding the steering round appropriately as the truck was driven forwards. The resulting Mark II Bendi, as presented to the museum, were much easier to operate, without the requirement for the driver to steer and turn the mast as separate operations. Throughout the nineties, the Bendi design was subject to further upgrades and enhancements, to improve performance and meet changing demands and legislation. Over the next decade virtually all the major components of the truck were to be updated and additional variants were added to the range. In 1995 the company introduced the first Gas powered Bendis to complement its growing range of electric trucks. Today's Bendis offer advanced features and a new chassis design allowing operation in aisles down to 1.6m – the narrowest aisle width possible with any truck. The efficiency and versatility of the Bendi makes it ever more appropriate for storage requirements across the board, as warehouse space is increasingly at a premium. More articles from Translift Bendi Limited: | 
