Increasing Forklift Safety

Project Do U Lift? (DUL) - Oryza Tirtawijata, Lorenzo Gonzalez, Alexander Kim, and Hoang Jimmy Nguyen from San Jose State University.

• Solidworks
• Autodesk Fusion 360
• Google Spreadsheet
• Paint 3D

Project DUL wants to address prevalent problems within the safety of the work environment making the current forklift safer in order to reduce accidents.

Forklifts are infamous for tipping over if weight is not distributed, center of mass is too high, or if the forklift goes too fast. Additionally, they fail to indicate hazard zones for the driver and pedestrians.

Initial Ideas:

• Beeping when approaching walls or people near will improve the existing forklift design by alerting people around as well as the person working the forklift. 
• Laser that measures the distance off the ground because you cannot keep lifting if it's too high which will also alert you if a height could be too dangerous with the weight you have on it.
• Cameras will improve the original design by allowing the driver more vision in order to stop possible accidents from occurring. 
• Color or pattern changes will improve the original design by allowing the forklift to be easily seen for people with disabilities.
• Retractable sidebars on lifting mechanism that improves original design since it allows you to hold objects that could possibly fall from the side but retract to prevent interference.  

Brainstorming ideas converted into a mindmap to simplify, revise, and expand. Then converted the mindmap into concepts we drew respectfully.

Through a Pugh Chart, we were able to collect our concepts and vote to narrow our choices. The final concepts chosen were the lasers and radar sensors.

This is our final concept that was derived from the final concept chosen from the Pugh chart. A presentation is shown to talk about each part.

Prongs:

• Add on prongs that measure the weight of an object through 2 springs
• Lasers that are attached to the bottom of prong to measure distance
• Both tied to the speedometer to restrict having a high elevated large mass to go dangerous speeds (especially when turning)

Lasers:

• Indicate hazard zones from the driver to the pedestrian
• Indicate where prongs should thrust into a pallet

Radar Sensor:

• Indicate obstacles around the forklift
• Tied with the speedometer to slow down if object is too close
• Tied with the beacon that flashes brighter and beeps faster and louder if its close proximity

Final CAD render and part files