STRADDLING agricultural, construction and industrial markets, JCB’s Teletruk range is top of the agenda in a roadshow to improve awareness of the nifty machine.
The crossover machine design features a forklift style body with a telehandler style boom instead of a mast providing added flexibility to a range of applications.
Australian JCB dealers have been hosting UK teletruck product specialist, Simon Cubitt on a educational roadshow with a particular focus on the agricultural segment.
“Agriculture is not the biggest area for the Teletruk as typically farmers will want to use a bigger telehandler if they want a machine to do everything, but there is certainly a niche available for us in bigger farming operations,” Mr Cubitt said.
“We see the Teletruk as being a tough terrain rather than rough terrain machine. If you take one onto really soft ground it will be challenged, but our 4x4 machines provide extra tractive effort that a forklift can’t in some applications.
“We’ve got Teletruks at Balco Australia’s WA hay export facilities and there is a number of benefits,” he said.
“The Teletruk will fit inside a container so it is quicker to load and being telescopic it will offload from one side.”
Simon said a telehandler will do the trick when there is plenty of space to manoeuvre, but the Teletruk provided a great option in confined spaces..
“If a farm has parts of an operation with limited space then a Teletruk’s flexibility and fuel saving compared to a telehandler will be huge.
“Over three to five years you will repay the investment as they use about half the fuel of a standard telehandler.”
The Balco machine is working about 20 hours per day and it is also fitted with telematics to monitor performance.
The Teletruk has been available in Australia for several years but has suffered a lack of awareness in the agricultural segment. There’s a range of eight models available in 2WD and 4WD variants, some with diesel or gas engines and with lift capacity from 2500 kg to 3500 kg.
Telescopic reach to 2.43 metres forward and 4.4 metres high is available in the largest TLT35D model.