A telescopic handler or telehandler is a machine that is well-known in the construction and agriculture industries. These machinery are similar in appearance and function to a lift truck or a forklift but are actually more like a crane rather than a forklift. The telehandler provides increased versatility of a single telescopic boom that could extend upwards as well as forwards from the vehicle. The operator has the ability to attach a lot of attachments on the boom's end. Some of the most popular attachments consist of: a muck grab, a bucket, a lift table or pallet forks.
A telehandler typically utilizes pallet forks as their most common attachment in order to move loads through areas that are normally unreachable for a standard forklift. Like for example, telehandlers can transport cargo to and from locations which are not normally reachable by standard forklift models. These devices can also remove palletized cargo from in a trailer and position these loads in high locations, such as on rooftops for instance. Before, this situation mentioned above will require a crane. Cranes can be pricey to utilize and not always a time-efficient or practical choice.
One more advantage is also the telehandlers biggest limitation: since the boom extends or raises when the machine is bearing a load, it also acts as a lever and causes the vehicle to become quite unstable, even with the counterweights on the rear. This translates to the lifting capacity decreasing fast as the working radius increases. The working radius is the distance between the center of the load and the front of the wheels.
Like for instance, a vehicle that has a 5000 pound capacity with the boom retracted might be able to safely lift only as much as 400 lb. when it is completely extended with a low boom angle. The same model with a 5000 lb. lift capacity which has the boom retracted might be able to easily support as much as 10,000 lb. with the boom raised up to 70.
England first pioneered the telehandler within Horley, Surrey. The Matbro Company developed these machines from their articulated cross country forestry forklifts. At first, they had a centrally mounted boom design on the front portion. This positioned the cab of the driver on the rear portion of the machinery, as in the Teleram 40 unit. The rigid chassis design with the cab situated on the side and a rear mounted boom has since become more and more famous.