It can be simple to overlook the essential tire, when it comes to the maintenance of the forklift. When you pick the wrong tire for your forklift, you could put huge increases on your operating costs, and more significantly increase your safety risks. If on the other hand, you pick right tire you could enjoy improved safety, significant cost-savings and an overall more effective operation. A correctly selected tire can actually decrease the downtime for replacement and potentially last 40% longer.
The forklift tire is a quite complex part of the machinery. It is therefore, easy to pick the wrong one accidentally. There are lots of different types of tires and brands, with a wide range of compounds and treads. This means you must be completely prepared with the correct information when you are purchasing tires so that you can decide on some tough and safe alternatives to help prolong the life of your forklift.
Your business should select the specific tire for their machinery based on the type of surface the machine would be operated on. Smoother surfaces and indoor applications for instance, would normally utilize tires that are smaller in size and made from rubber. On the contrary, outdoor operations need pneumatic tires. Pneumatic tires have a rubber tread and are filled with compressed air. These features give them a great grip on uneven and rough surfaces.
Forklift Tire Safety
Each year, there are approximately 200 people killed in accidents related for lift truck use. Ensuring forklift safety, such as correct inspection practices, can all contribute in to avoiding these dangerous and terrible mishaps from occurring.
Pre-Work Check
The tires of the lift truck needs to be inspected before each and every shift. Tires should ideally have the proper air pressure, which is set by the tire manufacturer. This is really important because if the tire pressure is too low, the machine could inadvertently tip over when a load is being lifted.
Types
The tires used on indoor lift trucks would be made out of solid rubber.
Other factors
The Occupational Health and Safety Administration or OSHA require that lift trucks used on a continual basis need to be checked at the completion of every shift. The operator should check the equipment for any kind of mechanical issues and the tires should be checked for excessive wear, cuts or obvious tire damage. Any problems that are detected should be dealt with as soon as possible to maintain safety.