Perkins Engines converts a 75kW diesel telehandler to a diesel electric hybrid

Perkins Engines converts a large 75kW diesel-powered telehandler into a hybrid machine by combining its 48V battery system with its 55kW Perkins 904J-E28T engine to enable electric-only running capability.

The aptly named Pathfinder machine is part of a programme that can show the industry what is possible by combining battery and diesel power solutions. It has already been a big hit, being used to support the day-to-day operators of its main Peterborough site.

Peter Haddock caught up with technical specialist Paul Muller there to learn more about Pathfinder and the performance benefits of this hybrid approach.

Paul: "Our Pathfinder project is all about exploring how we can change the power solution in an existing machine. And for this project we opted to purchase and retrofit a popular telehandler that would truly test our engineering capability.

"The first part of the process was modelling how we could fit all the components needed to deliver the 75kW power the machine needed. This included our 55 kW Perkins 904J-E28T engine, a 20 kW 48V P2 Motor Generator Unit (MGU), a 48V 3.9 kWh battery, an inverter and a powershift transmission."

"We then completely disassembled, repainted and rebuilt the machine, integrating all the parts of our hybrid technology into the same engine compartment. In addition, we designed and implemented a hybrid diesel engine start/stop technology to reduce idle time.

"After running the previous diesel machine to collect performance data, we monitored the Pathfinder machine as it carried out the same operations around our Peterborough site.

"Of course, there was one big difference as we could perform additional tasks indoors because the battery system could completely power the machine.

"Our data has also shown a 10% increase in efficiency of the hybrid Pathfinder compared to the original base machine

"So for certain applications, we have now proven that this type of hybrid approach could transform operations where sites need to work both indoors and outdoors.