A telehandler or a telescopic handler is a machine which is popular within the agriculture and construction businesses. These machinery are similar in function and appearance to a forklift or a lift truck but are really more like a crane instead of a forklift. The telehandler provides improved versatility of a single telescopic boom which can extend forwards as well as upwards from the vehicle. The operator has the ability to attach numerous attachments on the end of the boom. Several of the most common attachments consist of: a bucket, a muck grab, pallet forks or a lift table.
A telehandler typically utilizes pallet forks as their most common attachment in order to move cargo through locations that are usually unreachable for a conventional forklift. Like for instance, telehandlers can transport loads to and from locations that are not normally accessible by conventional forklift models. These devices also have the ability to remove palletized loads from inside a trailer and place these loads in high places, such as on rooftops for instance. Previously, this situation mentioned above will require a crane. Cranes could be really expensive to utilize and not always a practical or time-efficient alternative.
Another advantage is also the telehandlers largest limitation: as the boom raises or extends when the machinery is bearing a load, it also acts as a lever and causes the vehicle to become somewhat unbalanced, despite the counterweights on the back. This translates to the lifting capacity decreasing fast as the working radius increases. The working radius is the distance between the front of the wheels and the center of the load.
Once it is fully extended with a low boom angle for example, the telehandler will just have a 400 pound weight capacity, whereas a retracted boom could support weights as much as 5000 lb. The same model with a 5000 pound lift capacity that has the boom retracted may be able to easily support as much as 10,000 pounds with the boom raised up to 70.
England first pioneered the telehandler within Horley, Surrey. The Matbro Company developed these equipment from their articulated cross country forestry forklifts. At first, they had a centrally mounted boom design on the front section. This positioned the cab of the driver on the machinery's rear portion, like in the Teleram 40 unit. The rigid chassis design with a rear mounted boom and the cab located on the side has ever since become increasingly more famous.