Firm creates self-loading, discharging trailer
An Oregon firm has created a new “pallet walker” conveyor that allows truck trailers to be self-loading and unloading.
Using a technology called a “walking floor,” a 53-foot trailer can be loaded or discharged in about five minutes instead of 20 to 25 minutes by driving a forklift in and out of a trailer.
The new product is made by the Dock To Trailer Automation Inc. subsidiary of Keith Mfg. Co. of Madras, Ore.
Keith has been making similar systems for transporting bulk products such as cotton, wood chips, scrap metal and corn, for more than 25 years. It has sold about 30,000 of those systems, about 75 percent of which are in trailers and 25 percent of which are at fixed sites — for example, at cotton gins or furnaces that burn sawdust.
The new pallet walker, as well as walking floor systems for moving products within a warehouse, represents a new product for the company, said Scott Cloud, a sales representative.
Potential customers include carriers that have a need to load and unload trailers several times in a day. For example, logistics companies that needs to shuttle material to an automobile assembly plant from a nearby warehouse, or a company in the beverage industry might find such a conveyor useful.
He explains that the walking floor will nearly double the cost of a trailer, so that it is not attractive, for example, to a cross country driver who may spend several days on the road and less than an hour loading and discharging cargo.
Another benefit to the system is that it can reduce damage to cargo and the trailer, he said.
For more information about the product, including videos that show it in operation, visit http://www.dock2trailer.com.