When the time comes to pick the appropriate warehouse truck, it is a good idea to figure out how high you plan to lift your loads, how much you have to lift, how much space you have to work in and how far you would like to travel. These considerations would influence your purchasing decision and help decipher what forklift truck is really the ideal one out there to suit all your needs and meet your whole expectations.
Normal Aisles
Pedestrian stackers are the most cost-effective as these machinery are best utilized in normal width aisles and could complete ordinary warehouse stacking tasks. They can easily lift loads of less than 750kg and could stack them to heights of about 4.5 metres. Another type known as rider stackers can successfully lift loads to approximately 6 metres.
Reach trucks are yet a different alternative to consider. They give you much greater load and lift capacities and some models come complete with telescopic forks. This characteristic allows you the ability of stacking pallets two deep. For extra flexibility in goods handling, there is a multi-way and a 4-way reach truck that as the name implies, can be driven in four directions. These models are specifically great for handling long and bulky objects such as planks, boards and piping.
Counterbalance trucks are best suitable for traveling longer distance and are a good alternative for stacking jobs, especially block stacking. They are also a great alternative for stacking loads which weigh over 2 tonnes and free stacking.
A Tight Squeeze
The aisle space in a high-density storage operation would typically be much narrower, whilst the heights could be quite higher also. The Man-up telescopic lift trucks are best used in narrow aisle, high-bay stores. They offer the operator or driver a good view of the stacking process. There are also models called man-up combi trucks. These are quite versatile in that they can be used for both order- picking and stacking jobs. They can be driven all around the warehouse or utilized in narrow aisles.