MULTINATIONAL engineering company Linde has opened a 900sq m heavy truck assembly facility at its Merthyr Tydfil plant as part of a £16.5m investment programme.

Linde’s Merthyr plant – its Heavy Truck Division (LHTD) – designs and builds heavy forklift trucks and container handlers for loading containers used in the storage and freight industry.

The £1.5m Giraffe House 2, which stands at 80ft, will play an integral part in enabling Linde to meet an increase in demand and assist new product development, the company said.

Linde Heavy Truck Division’s expansion comes after a sales increase from 2007 of around 30% and represents the first stage in LHTD’s extensive plans to further expand its assembly line during 2009.

Giraffe House 2 will be used to finish the construction of vehicles that are capable of stacking up to eight 9ft 6in high freight containers and will strengthen LHTD’s status as the only UK manufacturer of such equipment.

Roland Hartwig, managing director of LHTD, said: “This has been a very productive year for LHTD. We have been able to increase our largest truck’s output by 40% and increase the output of our new forklift trucks significantly to meet the increased demand whilst maintaining consistent product deliveries.

“However, due to the vast rise we have seen in the demand for our trucks over the years, our existing facilities were showing a bottleneck in production.

“The new Giraffe House is part of the plan we announced in October last year to effectively double our output and provide for the increase in demand in the industry and for LHTD’s future plans for growth.”

Work on Giraffe House 2 began in 2008 and involved 22 contractors, including the main builder D Lucas & Sons from Pontypool.

Mike James, manufacturing engineer at LHTD, said: “We had some difficulty putting the doors up because of their sheer size. They are each 15m tall and presented quite a challenge to the contractors, but everyone pulled together throughout the project and we were able to complete everything on budget and on time. The only other real difficulty we encountered during the build was the weather.”