Hi Howard,
The Inverter I is a common failure on those models.usually a communication failure. In it's failed state it can be diagnosed with laptop which will show inverter not responding. Can you email me the bus name of your friend as I looked at a one of those trucks up your way a few months ago and curious if it's the same one.
Regards, Simon

A friend of mine has the exact same fault on his 2000 model, but it is intermittent, with no clue or pattern to the fault. The expert with laptop says its the main control box, but on another visit said it was the Inverter box sat on the motors.
My friend checked all the obvious, handbrake etc, and then asked me to look at the electronics. I stripped the control box and the inverter box down, but have not found any problems visually.
The only way forward that I can see is to swop out the two main items to establish where the problem lies. I did suggest he buys another forklift of the same model, but with a different fault, then I could crack it, but he was not amused!!
Any thoughts suggestion would be appreciated....

send me email contact had similar problem fault code pointed to brake pot evntually was board under front cover blows a component needs tech to diagnose and set up

Hello Simon K
Tanks for the advice. I will ask my neighbour wich is a car garage if he has an optic rpm counter i can use on the Mercedes.I wil give you a message tomorrow if it work or not. Best regards and thank you from Flemming in Denmark

Hi Flemming,
Okay,don't rub it in about our weather! :-)
If there were no obvious signs of corrosion at those plugs it is unlikely there but worth opening the pins up a little. The only other problem it may be is engine speed. The idle speed should be around 700-900 rpm. You can't measure this without the test equipment but it may be worth tweeking a little either way to experiment. If the engine speed doesn't match the load demands of the drive system it won't go and this is a fairly common problem.
Regards from a less windy but still rainy Britain!

Hi Simon K
Thank you for your reply, i have opned and closed the plug the other day but i havent opened the pins so i will chek the plug again tomorrow.
Best regards from Flemming in Denmark with wether like spring.

Hi Flemming,
The fact that the contractor stays in is a good sign as this indicates the drive circuits are ready. The problem may well then lie in wiring to the direction switches. As you sit on the truck remove the plastic panel on the right of the bulkhead/ dash. The main wiring loom comes up here and there are brown connector plugs. Check all of these plugs for corrosion and use a small screwdriver to open up the pins a little. Tomorrow I will try to find a wiring schematic to send to aid tracing wires back.
Best of luck from windy rainy Britain! :-)

Hello Simon K
I have the advice you and Bing gave me. On the handbrake contact can i mess.24 volt on both contactpoints when the handbrak is unused and it brake when i use the handbrake. The batterys is almost new and the connections is clean and in good condition.
In the box under the front on the seat there is a big contactor with open points, this is open until i start the engine,few seconds after engine start this contactor is going on and it opens again when i stopm the engine. There is about 26 volt betwen engine ground and the points when its on. I took out the driveboard and cheked the fuse and it is OK. The boards look to be in good conditions i could not se that somthings have been hot or was burned. I have cheked the on-neutral-back contacts by the steeringwheel again and there is no power up there, only on the contact to the backlight,but it is serviced from the lightswitch.
I have lift up the tower and opened and closed the multistik, maybe a bad connection but it dosent help. I have opened the el-engine cover and cheked the coal if it was burned or fast, i could move all.Then i went to the generator and cheked the same there, but the under coal i could only tuch( i am to fat to come under the forklift, and maybe to old to) but i feel that it move. The commmutator looks well, and there am i standing!.
I hope that you are able to help me. Thank you and best regards from Flemming in a sunny Denmark

Hello Simon K and Bing 098 thank you for your fast reply. I wil go tomorrow early and chek what you have written to me.
Best regards Flemming b

Try checking charging or Swap around the batterys. truck won't move if charging poor or drive battery down.

Handbrake switch is the first thing to check on those machines as drive is disabled with switch open. Then check if safety relay next to drive board is coming in and check fuses of 'power board' behind drive (u200) board. Let me know if not and I will try to help further and send some info.