The new PaxLift ambulift, from Verona, Italy-based Baumann, scooped the interRAMP award at inter airport Europe 2017. The vehicle was on show in the outside exhibition area and your editor took a ride
The PaxLift on display was the first fully working prototype unit of a model that has been in development for many years, says Baumann managing director Klaus Pirpamer. He said that he was “very proud and very happy” to demonstrate the vehicle, and equally so to have been awarded the interRAMP distinction. “It is recognition that PaxLift is something new and will change the standards set by ambulifts,” he declared.
PaxLift is very compact, only 2.55m wide, but its lift reaches a height of 8m. It enjoys four-wheel steering and has fully hydraulic suspension, making for a very comfortable ride. The lift rises very smoothly, without the jerky movement that has been the norm for some ambulifts of the past. It also lowers directly to floor level, making access at ground level easy for passengers with reduced mobility (PRMs), while the platform at the front of the lift is comfortably spacious. The steady platform can be operated and used in winds of up to 100km/h.
It can take up to six wheelchairs inside the spacious interior, facing forward for comfort. It is light and airy, with large windows offering all-round visibility. Air-conditioning and heating come as standard, all part of the intensive effort made in the design process, Pirpamer confirms, to develop an ambulift that is a pleasure to use for PRMs.
That was only made possible by the fact that PaxLift was completely purpose-built and designed as an ambulift. Unlike so many other ambulifts, it isn’t the result of a conversion from another vehicle type, Pirpamer points out, and that allows the sort of attention to detail for passenger comfort that hasn’t otherwise been feasible.
Moreover, while Baumann is well known outside the aviation industry for its side-loading forklifts, it soon became obvious – recalled Pirpamer – that side-loading was not the optimum position for an ambulift (for one thing, the movement of the platform and cabin tended to be too jerky). The firm did actually build a side-loading ambulift on the chassis of a side-loader, and sold two of these vehicles to Lufthansa LEOS, but quickly took the decision to design an all-new front-loading PRM vehicle that was to become the PaxLift.
Three patented lifting columns provide a smooth lift on the PaxLift, while the single driver-operator is positioned inside the cabin, lifting and lowering the vehicle by means of joystick control. Visibility is good out of the PaxLift’s large windows, and is further aided by four cameras located around the unit.
The standard vehicle is powered by a Stage 4 Final-compliant diesel engine, which enables it to reach a speed of 30km/h. The unit can drive while the cabin is in the raised position. An electric version of PaxLift will also be made available in the near future.
Pirpamer believes that the airport ambulift market might encompass something like 50-100 unit deliveries a year, and he hopes and expects that PaxLift will secure a good percentage of that market.
The PaxLift at inter airport will move on to Germany’s Düsseldorf Airport for operational testing. Production of another five PaxLifts is due to begin soon and the first order for the vehicle has already been taken – from a UK airport, although Pirpamer wouldn’t specify at the show which one it might be. Plenty more enquiries have been received from many parts of the world, but the UK market looks like it might be particularly promising in terms of potential sales, he said.
The vehicle will be marketed worldwide, he informed, a process that will benefit from the fact that Baumann already sells its material handling equipment – side-loaders – into 60 countries around the world. “We have the manpower and the experience to succeed [globally]”, he asserted.
