electric tugs Archives

5 Tips to Help You Choose the Right Material Handling Tug for Your Warehouse

Motorized Tugs Improve Safety

So, you’ve made the decision to implement material handling tugs in your warehouse to protect workers and improve productivity. How do you decide which ones are best for your applications? Our experts share five questions that will help you choose.

1. Does the tug promote a safe working environment?

A good tug allows a single employee to easily move heavy objects and materials with less effort. In addition to strength, the tug should offer maneuverability through tight quarters that will reduce the risk of collisions, falling containers and other mishaps.

2. Does the tug cut down on physical strain?

Transporting bulky or heavy items often results in workers twisting, turning and bending, which can lead to injuries as well as chronic pain in the long term. With our tugs, once the connection is made, a worker simply walks at a normal pace to operate it.

3. Does the tug promote proper posture?

When employees contort their bodies into awkward positions to move heavy objects, it places excessive stress on their musculoskeletal system. While it may get the job done, workers pay the price in sprained muscles and damaged joints. Operating our tugs lets employees maintain a neutral upright position that avoids strain.

4. Does the tug minimize the need for manual tasks?

Manual material handling, or MMH, is a frequent cause of back pain and overall fatigue. Statistics indicate that three-quarters of workers involved in MMH tasks experience injuries that make up one-third of compensation costs. Quality material handling tugs take the burden from workers, safeguarding their well-being.

5. Is the tug ergonomically designed?

Repetitive motions can often lead to long-term physical problems. A tug that’s ergonomically designed includes features that reduce wear and tear from these movements. It also creates a safe grip to optimize control and reduce the risk of accidents.

Choose Electric Material Handling Tugs from DJ Products

Our comprehensive line of battery-powered tugs, movers and pushers make warehouse safety a priority while also reducing your carbon footprint. Contact us at 800.686.2651 or use our handy online chat feature, where our knowledgeable Sales Engineers are ready to answer your questions.

Move More with Less with an Electric Tug on Your Side

Improve Safety and Efficiency

Having employees manually pull or push heavy loads or carts around can take a toll on their physical well-being and raise the risk of injuries. Manual labor also takes a longer time overall, since employees need to move carefully to avoid accidents. When you want to improve safety and efficiency in your facility, and there are many benefits to electric tugs.

How an Electric Tug Works

An electric tug runs on a motor rather than requiring manual operation. Some tugs also have hydraulic lift systems that can pick up loads for carrying. Being motorized allows employees to maneuver the tug and direct it from place to place without the use of physical labor. These tugs run on battery power, which can be recharged as often as needed. Many have a charge that lasts for a full workday.

Benefits of Electric Tugs

Using an electric tug provides several benefits for companies, including better safety and greater efficiency. These tugs prevent workers from having to manually pull and push heavy loads and equipment around. Instead, they can use the tug to move large pieces of equipment, heavy loads, and wheeled vehicles around. This helps reduce the risk of injuries and accidents in your workplace. The amount of force needed to move equipment or loads around is considerably less with an electric tug.

An electric tug can also help employees get work done more efficiently. These tugs can push or pull heavy loads and equipment around more quickly than manual labor. This allows employees to accomplish more during the workday instead of spending a significant amount of time moving one load or piece of equipment.

Electric Tug Solutions from DJ Products

DJ Products offers electric tug solutions for multiple industries. These tugs have a variety of wheel load, cart, and attachment configurations available, making them versatile. Our CartCaddyHD Chain Drive Electric Tug can move up to 50k pounds of equipment and lift up to 6k pounds. We also have the CartCaddy WagonWheel Shorty Tug that can pull up to 3k pounds.

If you’re interested in purchasing electric tugs, contact DJ Products. Our customer service team can help you find the right solutions for your business.

Safety Tips for Operating Electric Tugs and Dollies

Improve Safety with an Electric Trailer Dolly

Our Trailer Dolly is so efficient and easy to use that workers may start to take it for granted. Keep your workplace accident-free by sharing these safety tips for operating electric tugs and dollies from our Sales Engineers.

- Before operating an electric mover, conduct an inspection to make sure everything’s in working order. Does anything look off-kilter? Are all parts moving as they should? If anything even seems questionable, always err on the side of caution and report the possible malfunction to a supervisor.
- Whenever possible, face the direction of travel when operating a mover. If you do need to walk backwards, do an initial check to make sure the path is clear. Look periodically to avoid any sudden obstacles. Installing mirrors can help monitor blind spots.
- Keep all body parts, especially feet and ankles, clear of the mover. In case of emergency, don’t try to use your body to stop the mover. Engage the safety stop switch.
- Our Trailer Dolly and other movers are designed to maneuver well around corners and in tight spaces, but use caution when going up or down a ramp or incline.
- Make sure all aisles are free of pallets, cartons, trash and other obstructions.
- Create clearly delineated pedestrian walkways to keep foot traffic out of the way of movers. Our movers have optional safety lights and light poles to increase visibility.
- Keep floors well-maintained. Clean up spills promptly and repair cracks, bumps, holes and other hazards.
- Ensure all new employees are fully trained in operating electric tugs, pushers and movers. Conduct ongoing refresher sessions to help workers incorporate safety awareness in their everyday activities.
- Establish a regular maintenance schedule for material handling equipment to keep movers in good shape and catch problems early.

Make Workplace Safety a Priority with the Trailer Dolly

Do you have a goal to reduce workplace injuries? Our battery-powered tugs, movers and pushers do all the heavy lifting, so a single worker can transport loads weighing thousands of pounds with ease. They’re also ergonomically designed to prevent carpal tunnel syndrome and other repetitive-motion injuries.

Reducing Injury Risk for Hand Truck Operators

A recent case study of the beverage industry by ergonomic consultant ErgoWeb studied injury risk factors for hand truck operators and prevention protocols. The study’s findings have obvious parallel implications for any business or industry that utilizes manual hand trucks.

The study was prompted by significant musculoskeletal stress injuries — particularly back injuries — reported by delivery workers. Similar injury rates are common in any environment where materials are constantly loaded and unloaded and where hand trucks are used to maneuver and transport materials. Affected businesses include delivery firms, moving companies, shipping operations, loading docks, groceries, retail and big box stores, warehouses, fulfillment centers, storage facilities, auto service centers, manufacturing plants, supply centers and many others.

The study found that maintenance and weight distribution issues resulted in the greatest number of operator injuries. The highest risk of potential injury was attributed to the following:

Underinflated hand truck tires which placed undue stress on the musculoskeletal system.
Unequal weight distribution of product cases increased back compressive force during lifting, increasing the risk of back injury.
Improperly located product required twisting and lifting from un-optimal heights, increasing risk of back and shoulder injuries.
Improperly balanced hand truck loads placed unnecessary musculoskeletal stress on workers.

While new loading patterns, better hand truck maintenance and improved operator training can help reduce injury risk, a far more effective solution is to replace manually operated hand trucks with ergonomically-designed electric carts and tugs. Powered carts allow a single operator to easily transport and maneuver maximum loads without risk of injury. Adjustable handholds, adjustable speed controls, adjustable beds, scissors lifts, powered platforms and other ergonomic features allow loads to be handled at optimal levels to significantly reduce the risk of musculoskeletal injury.

If you want to reduce the risk of worker injury in your facility, talk to the experts at DJ Products about replacing your outdated hand trucks with ergonomically-designed powered carts and tugs.

Still Time to Register for the ProMat 2011 Material Handling Expo

We’re just about two months away from the material handling event of the year. There is still time to register as an attendee for the ProMat 2011 International Material Handling Expo and this year promises to be one of the biggest and best to date.

This year’s Expo, scheduled for the third week in March, will feature more than 700 exhibitors and 80 educational sessions showing the latest equipment innovations and supply chain solutions. Attendees can expect information and demonstrations of products that will help cut costs, improve workplace efficiency and help to reduce your business’s potential burden on the environment.

Over the course of the three day expo you’ll get to explore more than 300,000 square feet of the latest electric tugs, power movers and ergonomically designed material handling equipment available. You’ll see cutting edge products that were specifically designed to make your business faster and more efficient and to keep your employees safer while they perform their duties. Streamlining your supply chain operation will give you a distinct advantage over your competition and the ProMat 2011 expo will show you the perfect solutions for your individual business situation.

As an added bonus, registration for this year’s ProMat expo will also provide access to the Automate 2011 expo which will feature the latest innovations in robotics and vision and motion control. Automate 2011 will give you access to hundreds more exhibitors showcasing everything from automatic data collection to automation control and material handling conveyors. Registration for entrance into both shows is free and will provide access to a wealth of information for improving the efficiency and safety of your manufacturing, warehouse of supply chain environment.

The Right Equipment Electric Tugs can Save a Project

Just because a piece of heavy duty equipment or a fully loaded cart may have wheels, that doesn’t necessarily mean that it will be easy to move. Large pieces of necessary equipment in plants and factories and fully loaded parts and product carts can often top out at upwards of fifty thousand pounds – and that is one load that no employee should be attempting to move manually.Moving products and gear that are that heavy requires a distribution center or factory to have the right electric tugs for the job. Attempting to manually move a piece of equipment or cart that large, even if there were several employees assisting in the move, would most certainly result in injury or possibly damage to surrounding property. DJ Products makes rugged and easy to use electric tugs that can easily handle moving wheeled equipment and carts of anywhere from ten to fifty thousand pounds.The electric tugs from DJ has three 12 volt batteries and is designed to last for a full sixteen hours of continuous operation before needing a recharge – this will get your employees through those long jobs where some overtime is required or through two full eight hour shifts without having to stop. This reliability puts the DJ Products electric tugs well ahead of what you would get from propane powered tugs.Though this particular electric tugs looks small by standards, there is absolutely no lack in power – this unit was designed to have every bit of power that a larger bulkier tug would have but packed it into a sleek frame that allows employees to maneuver easily in cramped quarters. The fact that this tug is so easy to maneuver means that your employees are less likely to be involved in accidents and that everyone in the plant is safer when the tug is in operation.Any time you can add a piece of equipment to your arsenal that is easier and safer to operate and more reliable than what your crew is currently operating with, you give your staff a better chance to complete jobs on time and to ultimately satisfy your customers.

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