There are times it pays to examine the method of choosing a lift truck. For instance, does your company always select the same units for your dock work? If so, you can potentially miss out on a more efficient truck. There may be different other models on the market that allow more to get done as they provide less exhaustion to operators. You might be able to take advantage of loading trailers in a more cost-effective manner. By doing some evaluation and research, you can determine if you have the best equipment to meet all of your requirements. By reducing operator fatigue, you can drastically increase your performance.
When determining forklift models which deal with your particular issues some of the key factors to consider may comprise:
Trailer Loading Frequency:
You probably won't require an expensive lift truck to complete jobs if your shipping and receiving department loads just a few semi-trailers or box trucks per week. An inexpensive walkie-rider or walkie model would be able to deal with the task if: A 4500 to 6000 pound capacity is sufficient and you do not need to stack loads inside the trailer. Last of all, you must think about whether or not the transition from the dock floor to the dock leveler and into the trailer is not too jarring for the operator because the small load wheels must travel over the dock plate.
If your shipping facility is always loading trailers on the other hand, a stand-up end control unit may make more sense over a walkie-rider or a walkie model. These battery-powered forklifts easily fit into a standard 108 inch trailer door. Their masts allow in-trailer stacking. These types of forklifts offer a model capacity range from 3000 to 4000 lbs.
Operator Duties:
For material handling needs, each business has a slightly different system. Several lift truck operators would usually load and unload products in the shipping department along with storing objects on inventory racks, replenish the manufacturing line, handle the paperwork associated with the loads, attach and scan bar codes and other tasks. Generally, the forklift operators who are constantly on and off of their lift trucks during their shifts find it much faster and less tiring to exit a stand-up control unit, rather than a sit down kind.