Sometime when you think of freight being handled almost always you thing of the guys in the brown truck, stopping door to door delivering anywhere from a single box to several boxes before driving off to the next stop. Sometimes freight isn’t always shipped in a single box form, sometimes freight comes with several boxes in a palletized bundle for pickup, and these items can be bundled together from a giant box secured to a pallet, to several boxes secured together, or equipment and machinery. The great thing with this type of packaging is they slide together nicely in a truck providing easier securing of the cargo during transport. Now these loads can also become rather heavy and often require the use of a forklift for transportation. What is a forklift? A forklift is a powered industrial lift truck, the truck is powered by an engine or battery, the front has two adjustable forks that can narrow or widen depending on the load requirements. The steering of a forklift is in the rear, this provides great maneuverability and the ability to make tight turns. The forks can raise and lower giving the truck the ability to load and unload from various heights.
While the forklift is one of the best tools for moving freight on and off of a truck fast and efficiently, the forklift can also have problems with load instability when turning while the load is raised in the air. Forklifts are used all throughout the freight industry, and any large company with pallets being delivered or shipped almost certainly has a fleet of them operating because of their usefulness. Dry van trailers and flatbed trailer shippers, the forklift works great to remove pallets from the rear of dry vans, this is helpful when the trucks are not equipped with a lift gate, and the lift gate would normally give the trailer the ability to lower the load from the trailer to the ground. The forklift is also extremely useful when loading and unloading flatbed trailers, the forklift have the ability to access the freight from the rear as well as both sides of the trailer. This is useful for loads that are oversized or pieces of equipment that are larger than a pallet, the forklift can lift the items off the trailer and place them where needed. Freight companies like Freight Rate Central, Inc. determine what trailer services are needed when it comes to shipping your freight, they can coordinate with the shipper and receiver to make sure the proper equipment to load and unload your freight is available so you can sit back and track your shipment electronically and know that your freight is being transported safely and efficiently.
