When it comes to maintaining the lift truck, it could be easy to neglect the simple yet essential tire. If you pick the wrong tire, you can end up accidentally with a huge increase in fleet operating expenses, or increased safety risks, which is worse yet. If however, you select right tire you can enjoy improved safety, significant cost-savings and an overall more efficient operation. A correctly chosen tire could actually decrease the downtime for replacement and potentially last 40% longer.
The forklift tire is a somewhat complex part of the equipment. It is thus, easy to select the wrong one accidentally. There are numerous different brands of tires and kinds, with a wide variety of compounds and treads. This means you must be completely prepared with the correct data when you are going shopping for tires so that you can select some tough and safe options to help prolong the life of your lift truck.
The particular kind of tire chosen for a lift truck depends on the kind of surface you would be utilizing the machine on. For instance, smoother surfaces and indoor applications generally use tires that are made from rubber and that are a smaller size. On the contrary, outdoor applications require pneumatic tires. Pneumatic tires are filled with compressed air and have a rubber tread. These features give them a good grip on uneven and rough surfaces.
Lift Truck Tire Safety
Every year, 200 individuals are killed in forklift or lift truck related accidents each year. Ensuring lift truck safety, like for example correct inspection practices, could all contribute in to avoiding these horrible and dangerous accidents from taking place.
Pre-Work Inspection
The tires of the forklift have to be checked before each shift. Tires must ideally have the right air pressure, that is set by the manufacturer of the tire. This is very essential because if the tire pressure is very low, the machine could inadvertently tip over when a load is being lifted.
Kinds
The tires utilized on indoor forklifts would be made out of solid rubber.
Other factors
Occupational Health and Safety Administration or OSHA places a requirement on the continual use of lift trucks. These forklifts are required to be inspected at the end of every shift. The driver should check the machinery for any mechanical issues and the tires should be checked for excessive wear, cuts or apparent tire damage. Any problems which are detected should be addressed as soon as possible to maintain safety.