Assessing the impact of charging operations on electric lift automated guided vehicles

Abstract

The Automated Guided Vehicle (AGV) is the most commonly used piece of horizontal movement that uses electric power from an internal battery pack. With much focus on the charging strategy, current charge operation models lack the ability to model large scale terminal operations and to incorporate new types of horizontal movement. The objective of this research is to show the impact of recharge operations on terminal performances. A discrete event simulation model is based on the characteristics of APMT MVII to model the current impact. The results of numerical experiments show charging operations have a limited impact on the productivity of Lift-AGV. An exception is the change in battery type. Using a Li-ion battery lowers the need for recharging and increases total productivity. The findings show the importance of integrating modelling to accurately project terminal operations.