When the time comes to pick the appropriate warehouse truck, it is a good idea to figure out how high you intend to lift your loads, how much you need to raise, how much space you have to work in and how far you want to travel. These considerations will influence your buying decision and help decipher which forklift truck is the best one out there to meet all your needs and meet your overall expectations.
Normal Aisles
The most economical trucks are pedestrian stackers. These machines are ideal for working in normal width aisles and completing ordinary stacking tasks inside a warehouse. They could easily raise cargo of less than 750kg and be able to stack them to heights of roughly 4.5 metres. Another type known as rider stackers could successfully raise loads to roughly 6 metres.
Yet another option to consider are reach trucks as they provide much greater load and lift capacities, whereas several models complete with telescopic forks. This characteristic allows you the ability to stack pallets two deep. For added flexibility in handling goods, there is a multi-way and a 4-way reach truck which as the name implies, can be driven in four directions. These models are specifically best for handling bulky and long objects like boards, piping and planks.
Counterbalance trucks are best suitable for traveling longer distance and are a good option for stacking jobs, especially block stacking. They are also an excellent choice for free stacking and stacking cargo that weigh more than 2 tonnes.
A Tight Squeeze
The aisle space in a high-density storage operation would typically be a lot narrower, whereas the heights can be quite higher too. The Man-up telescopic lift trucks are best utilized in high-bay, narrow aisle 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 fairly versatile in that they could be used for both order- picking and stacking jobs. They could be used in narrow aisles or driven all over the warehouse.