Vertical-mast and rough-terrain lift trucks keep picking up and placing various construction materials on various jobsites even through the rise and evolution of telehandlers on the market. There are lots of conventional-style lift trucks offered within the material handling business which lost market share to telehandlers. This happened specially when the challenger broke onto the construction scene. Since that time, sales numbers have become stable. Vertical-mast forklifts have re-surfaced and seem to be becoming more popular once more thanks to their greater production, modification of certain telehandler-like features and low cost.
Straight-mast machinery would finish two times the job which a telehandler will do because of their maneuverability and ground speed. Interestingly enough, rental outfits are beginning to charge higher rates on straight-mast models.
In the rough-terrain lift truck industry, rental purchasers have been having a greater influence. More than half of all vertical-mast lift trucks are presently being sold to a rental yard. These acquisitions are generally driven mainly by utilization, which is a factor closely followed by purchase price.
The telehandler has become a very common equipment in the material handling industry. Their popularity has given them a super advantage in terms of rental utilization. Their overall expansion has been moderated by their higher price. There is some lift truck users who feel that telehandlers are not practically as productive as opposed to traditional rough-terrain lift trucks for unloading and loading repetitive jobs. This means that although competition among telehandler marketers has lowered their prices, many prefer the RT forklifts which have been working well for decades.
In comparison, the telehandler is ganglier, a little slower to operate and needs a higher level of skillfulness to finish the task. On the upside, they get the reach if they require it. There would always be a place in the industry for forklifts however, since there are places which you could not access with a telehandler.
Rough terrain forklifts are normally compact machines, smaller but more able to lift a heavier cargo vertically as opposed to the telehandler. Basically, so as to utilize the right machine for your application, you should determine what jobs exactly you will be completing, the type of conditions and environment you would be operating in and what your load capacity is. All these factors would help you decide what the best alternatives available are.