The lift truck has become such an important piece of machinery found and utilized in most warehousing and industrial operations, since its introduction to the market more than 90 years ago in the 1920's. Among the forklift's pioneers, Clark has grown to become an industry top supplier in the material handling business. Other well-known names in the making of these machines consist of: Yale, Hyster, Nissan Toyota, Mitsubishi and Cat.
Hyster has grown to become among the most popular units of forklifts within the industry. As a matter of fact, in some places, the word "Hyster" is synonymous with forklift. Different other names for this industrial lifting machines include: fork truck, stacker truck, high/low, lift truck and jitney.
The ancestor of today's equipment was initially developed in the early part of the 19th century. At this time, small, battery-powered units were made for the purpose of moving traveler's luggage at the Altoona train station in Pennsylvania. In WWI, some different kinds were made within England specially for use in the material handling industry. These machinery evolved as a solution to the lack of manpower at that time.
The modern equivalents come in a variety of sizes and configurations. There are the big truck-mounted forklift units which are also referred to as sod loaders and then the opposite end of the spectrum has small hand truck units. There are also a line of automated versions referred to as forklift automated guided vehicles that are practically robotic in nature. These models were developed to improve production and as a means of lowering operational costs.
A regular lift truck is able to utilize a wide array of attachments which are capable of being added for a variety of specific functions. The motors can be internal combustion or IC models, working on gasoline, propane or diesel, or there are battery operated options which need regular charging. Standard warehouse models would usually be rated to raise between about 1 and 5 tons.
The forklift has become a priceless part in the material handling industry. Thousands of these models are used on a daily basis all around the world to complete tasks which used to require a lot more man-power. Operators need to take stringent training programs in order to run these heavy machines legally and safely. Many employees have longer careers now and better health overall due to their not having to raise things manually anymore as the forklifts can handle those situations now instead.