On May 30th, at 1:00 p.m. the VAK Innovation Prize 2022 was presented at the IFAT in Munich. The following companies won in the machines category:

Kanalreiniger.eu, a company that sells and rents sewer cleaning machines, won first prize. In the eyes of the jury, the innovation was probably that Kanalreiniger combined existing solutions into one package and offered them for sale or rent. These are a Green G from ecarry as the chassis, the 35 E-Total body from Xdea and the KT 30 high-pressure system from Pratisolli.

Of particular interest for our micro-hydraulic blog is the company that made second place:

The company Jungo AG presented a fully electric implement carrier, which was exhibited both as basic vehicle and in the version as a street sweeper at the Jungo stand in Hall C5. There were a lot of innovations:

A major innovation is the use of micro-hydraulics. In this way, hydraulic interfaces to the attachments are avoided, which further accelerates the quick-change system and eliminates the leakage problem. Instead of 80 liters of oil, only approx. 3 litres are required and lubrication or oil changes are not necessary for the entire service life of the machine.

Furthermore, an exchangeable battery system that allows the vehicle to be operated 24/7, without charging breaks (the batteries can be changed within a few minutes). In the meantime, the second set of batteries can be slowly charged, for example, directly using renewable energy without having to store it temporarily in a wall box, for example. With a larger fleet, this also prevents the peak in energy consumption that usually occurs during the lunch break and after the end of the shift.

The system is also scalable between 15 and 60 KW/h in 4 stages, so that only as much energy and thus weight is carried as the current task of the multifunctional machine requires.

In addition, wheel hub motors from Elan Systemtechnik are used, which currently offer the highest recuperation on the market when braking.

Overall, care was taken to leave the smallest possible carbon footprint right from the design with the selection of materials and then throughout the entire life cycle. Production takes place at the Rostock-Laage site in an industrial park fed with green hydrogen. The Jungo Group takes back used vehicles and refurbishes them for further use instead of recycling or even scrapping them.

Palfinger GmbH took third place with their eDrive battery crane.