Vertical-mast and rough-terrain lift trucks keep picking up and placing various building supplies on various jobsites even through the evolution and rise of telehandlers on the market. There are many traditional-style forklifts available in the material handling industry that lost market share to telehandlers. This happened particularly when the competition broke onto the construction scene. Ever since that time, sales numbers have become stable. Vertical-mast lift trucks have re-surfaced and seem to be becoming more popular again because of their greater productivity, alteration of certain telehandler-like features and low cost.
Straight-mast machines would finish two times the job that a telehandler will do due to their ground speed and maneuverability. Interestingly enough, rental outfits are beginning to charge higher rates on straight-mast models.
Within the rough-terrain lift truck industry, rental purchasers have been having a greater influence. Over 50 percent of all vertical-mast lift trucks are presently being sold to a rental yard. These acquisitions are usually driven mainly by utilization, which is a factor closely followed by purchase price.
The telehandler has become an extremely popular machinery in the material handling business. Their popularity has given them a better advantage in terms of rental utilization. Their overall expansion has been moderated by their higher price. There is several forklift users who feel that telehandlers are not practically as useful as opposed to conventional rough-terrain forklifts for loading and unloading repetitive tasks. This means that even if competition among telehandler marketers has lowered their prices, many choose the RT lift trucks which have been working well for decades.
In comparison, the telehandler is ganglier, a little slower to operate and needs a higher level of skill 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 though, since there are places which you can not access with a telehandler.
Rough terrain lift trucks are generally compact machinery, smaller but more able to carry a heavier cargo vertically compared to the telehandler. Basically, in order to use the right machinery for your application, you should determine what jobs exactly you would be completing, the kind of environment and conditions you would be operating in and what your load capacity is. All these factors would help you decide what the right options available are.