Forklift Forks - Making a Wise Selection While Purchasing Them

Forks need daily inspection under normal working conditions and are subjected to thorough inspection once every six months. Operators must make a visual inspection of forklift forks before they begin their daily work. These checks will enable them to identify some permanent cracks or distortions if any.

Thorough inspections should only be done by a trained technician and must involve checkups for distortion, excessive wear and cracks on the forks. Depending upon their usages, forks may need to be inspected more often.

At six months, the trained inspector will also check the blades of the fork for any wear. Actually forks are continuously subjected to abrasion by steel shelving, concrete floors, etc and this can significantly reduce their thickness till a stage reaches when they are unable to life loads to their designed capacity. The forklift fork inspector will have to ascertain the thickness.

The inspector will also examine the fork for any distortion as they can bend out of shape. Depending upon the degree of distortion, some forks can be easily straightened. Any cracks in the hanger and heel should also be checked minutely. Sometimes cracks appear on the forks where the attachments are welded on. Sometimes this can also occur in the radius of a bent area.

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Cracks can be easily detected using dye penetrate or magnetic particle on periodic basis. You should contact your forklift manufacturer or supplier to seek additional information on this.

You should never attempt to repair your forks. Only an experienced fork manufacturer has the

capability to repair the forks. Similarly, forks should never be modified without consulting the forklift supplier. Any in-house modification or repair can reduce the fork strength drastically.

Whenever replacement is required, you should replace only with high quality forks. While ordering new forks insist on the ones with upset heel or forged ones.

You should take care not to overload forklift forks. Operators should keep the load within the limits of their capacities and they should be aware of this fact. This is important because any overloading can weaken or even bend the forks.

The load should be positioned as per the load center recommended on the chart. The load limit of the truck would decrease as the load center is raised. You should avoid adding any excess weight for counterbalancing the forklift. Forklift forks are essential pieces of equipment and should be carefully used after daily inspection and this task should be included in the daily pre-start-up checklist.

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