sporto5 - Well stated. Crown & Raymond dealers & manufactuer main focus is Class I, II & III products - yes Crown is now into the engine powered stuff & have offered Komatsu, Daewoo (Doodan) products for many years. But their main focus is on warehouse products & warehouse systems or this is where these dogs eat.
Other forklift companies/dealers offer products in all 5 five classifications - their resources (financical, buildings, support equipment, personnel knowledge/training,) customer /application expertice to support those are spread overall 5 differnt types of products - sort of like the "jack of all trades" syndrome or going to a general practice doctor for heart surgery.
In the Southeast - Carolina Handling would be my selection. A simple example - last Friday at 6:30 PM I saw one of ther service vans leaving and industrial park near where I live (45 miles east of downtwown Atlanta)- their home office is NE of Atlanta. One of two things happened - the service tech was seeing a girlfriend in that park or was taking care of a customer (which I do know they have in that park).
When I was in sales working the south side of Atlanta it was not uncommon to see theirservice van's in the Industrial parks there early in the am 6 or 7 am. Their location is closer to the north east side of Atlanta.
No, I don't work or every had for either company - I did work for several of those "jack of all trades" companies - dealers & manufacturer

Bob m the only down fall on the 7400 is the over the mast hoses. Talk about a pain to replace. Other than that I like them.

Carolina Handling is the hands down winner here.

Hyster hired a Raymond Engineer and designer about 5 years ago. The New product looks interesting? But I will go with the Reliability of Raymond product. They deleloped the Reach from day one and continue to improve the durability. The New 7400 AC unit is still the Industry leader. As for the Hyster, This is the newest design, I've seen 10 "New" Hyster Reach models in the last 28 years. Don't be a "Pioneer" i.e.: People on the side of the road with arrows in their back.

As you cans see there is a lot of bias based on the brands people seel. This does not hslp answer your question in a maaner that helps you in your decision. I am not a sales person for any brand and have had experience with them all. First to you question on which dealer is better in terms of service. The answer is both are good however there are som areas that you need to investigate. One would be what iseach of their average respomse time for service calls, Second is how far is their nearest location to your facility in case additional parts are needed for a repair. Third is what is the size and make up of their rental fleets. Some dealers will tell you that they have hundreds of trucks avaible in their rentsl fleets however, if they do not have enough models of the type you use with the specs that you need the size of their fleets do not matter. If you are purchasing reach trucks, order pickers, tuuret trucks, and or walkies my experience has been that Raymond dealers tend to have better equipped rental fleets for those models. Crown would be second and Hyster and Yale a distant third. This means that if one of your trucks goes down and you need a replacement truck or if you need addional trucks for peak seasons, inventory etc.. the dealer with the based match of rental trucks to your needs will be able to help you more. Both Crown and Raymond make good trucks from a mechanical standpoint and they would not have the majority of the market if they did not. I would also suggest you look at their energy efficiency as this will effect your costs and productivity and the trucks productivity. The truck that get's the most work done for you, consumes the least amount of energy and costs the least to maintain is what you want to look at. I hope this helps!

should wait to make a decision for a couple months... go look at the front of the crown website regarding reach

ok. use Zapi controller, but the std. not use something developed by hyster or with zapi, only order "controllers for the truck". it's my point. built for sell, not for leadership.

forkliftchick: you obviously have not seen any of the hyster xn's, zr's, zrs's, or zac units that have been coming out over the past 3 years.... and raul s, it's not ge based anymore...

the only that i can say is.
the Red´s mast, yes, i saw when they carck it's true
and no less than 3
Hyster , is a good brand but in 33,000 lbs ic not in electrics.
Crown is better year after year, yes with troubles but what brand not?

and the technicians only change parts, not find the trouble.

i'm a technician and fix almost any brand, Red have a technology from the ice age. too old!!

Hyster, still use GE technology, don't put anithing of their part

and i can follow with this, a good technician uses his brain not his mouth or finger in this case,

please talk about systems not about brands

and any brand is the best in something not in all.

clark have +90 years and so?
hyster maybe equal and so?
crown proposed, who else? do you see his ic C5? is a good forklift!!

and more and more and more.

well, ""I'm retire , for you wrecking my reputation"" (mexican adage)

best regards

Grumpy, Hyster over Beige or Red are you kidding, not even in the same class, not in the same universe.
Hyster electrics are so far behind you could say they look first.

Thanks for the laugh though.

Mr. Joe d.
Once again a friendly poster has made my point.You admit to comparing antique faithful Hysters with modern red trucks.You also admit no familiarity with the up to date Hyster product.
I point out that the reason Hyster is often not mentioned when electric warehouse products are discussed by the red and gray is because they do not wish to compete with an obviously superior product.Like one fast food restaraunt comparing their burger to another burger.Why don't they compare their offering with a nice steak restaraunt? Billions and Billions sold as they say.Market share does not make fine food or the best machine.Nice sales tactic though.
As for red colors under other brands of paint.There is an orange brand named after an insect larvae that puts their paint on red too.It is done as a marketing ploy to fill a gap in application.Price and sales drives that ,not quality.
As for past threads and identities....
I noticed a past thread was ended by the editors of this web site.Sorry folks, but I missed the tussel that brought about big brothers entry into the scene.I was away for a bit.I tuned in a day too late. I don't care who the participants are.The flush out theory is paranoia.I was even alluded to as a corporate man trying to lure out unsuspecting whiners.Probably because I have a vocabulary that includes more that colorful adjectives.
I ,for my part, enjoy discussions with People such as the ones who have joined this thread.People proud and confident in their skills.People who serve their company and managers with pride.We all have to serve someone to get a paycheck.Do it well ! Work hard ! Stand up and defend your brand, craft, and reputation ! I am an elite Hyster technician myself.As I have mentioned in other threads, I say to the testing for competance "bring it on !" I rejoice in the chance to prove my skills! Manager? Yes Sir I've got one ! My job ? Glad to have it !

Others feel this way.....Booo Hooo Hooo my manager made me earn my pay today.Waahh wahh I had to take a test that might prove I"m ignorant.
If you truely disagree with where your management is going and wish to express yourself and fear retribution. Write an anonymous letter and mail it while out of town.Or *** in that gut and walk in that office.You might come out with promotion. (I suggest you count the costs and facts before that last one.)You may have a justifiable point, or ,you may find you don't know what you're talking about.
You don't spread a private family argument all over the neighborhood. That's just bad form.
My Brand....Proudly made in North Carolina.As am I.

altlift, I've heard decent things about Carolina Handling (we hired a guy from there a few years back) but, if you haven;t already, you my ask around of your customers/suppliers as to who they use in that area to get a feel not only for the equipment but the level of service. As for brands (as you can see) I'm partial to Raymonds. For many years (until Toyota bought BT-Raymond) Raymond components were being used in Clarks, Toyotas, Yales and Mitsubishis (Mitsi went so far as to just repaint 1998 112 walkie-riders green, slap Mitsi stickers on em and call them "new" 2002 Mitsi walkie-riders...when the paint on the forks wore off it was red underneath). I think that says alot for the product.

Madman, this is like the age old Ford versus Chevy arguement....I've driven and had to repair both so I can argue the good points and the bad points of both. Unfortunately I can't argue the same between Hyster and a Raymond. Why you ask? In the years I worked as a road tech for a major dealership, bouncing from customer to customer (quite a few with hodge-podge fleets of multiple brands of narrow aisle equipment) in a city the size of Houston, aside from IC Hysters, I've only seen or worked on a handful of Hyster electrics (less than 10 to be exact). One was a sitdown and the rest were antique cable steer orderpickers that were being gradually traded out for Raymonds. Now my questions is, if Hysters are so "superior" to all others, especially the red and gray, why didn't I see more of them out there? Is their "superiority" a market secret? Or is it they don't have a big enough dog in the fight to steal a sale on a Raymond, Crown, or even a Clark, Toyota, Yale, or Mitsubishi for narrow aisle equipment? Gee.....I believe this dovetails into the market share discussion. You drive your Hyster and I'll drive my Raymond, Ok? Now, I guess we need to give altlift back his thread.

and if madman "reads his posts after he puts them in" he might recognize" that saying the same thing 2 or more times does not make it -more- true".
I have to say though, if someone from Carolina handling was assigned the chore of making sure they knew who was posting here, to avoid a thread like the other "Barlow world" thread that madman took part in, where Barlow wanted to ID who was posting less than flattering remarks about people in the company, this was an excellent method and type of posting to "draw out the crowd".
I would also like to note that the only 2 types of argument I have seen so far in this thread are either FUD or the "2 billion flies can not be wrong" argument, and have yet to see any concrete types of reasonings for one company over the other. and really from where I stand, it is a roll of the dice, and getting to know the local service techs work ethics would be far better than any discussion we might have about either the brands we get paid to care for, or the brands we don't make any commission on the sale of.

Call the bent outriggers operator damage if you wish.I called it pot metal.Why ? Those 50 to 80 thousand hour Hysters never had that problem.Same factory,same operators.You shopuld have seen that red tech making excuses, and grinding out cracks, and welding on more metal.Then cover it with the old enamel.The paint never looks good.Red on black and vice versa.They charge the customer for that paint.It's their GOLD service you know.I appreciate a good paint job.I see a good paint sales job.
And if "say no mo" reads his posts after he puts them in, he will see he does need a translator.

Call the bent outriggers operator damage if you wish.I called it pot metal.Why ? Those 50 to 80 thousand hour Hysters never had that problem.Same factory,same operators.You shopuld have seen that red tech making excuses, and grinding out cracks, and welding on more metal.Then cover it with the old enamel.The paint never looks good.Red on black and vice versa.They charge the customer for that paint.It's their GOLD service you know.I appreciate a good paint job.I see a good paint sales job.
And if "say no mo" reads his posts after he puts them in, he will see he does need a translator.

Somehow I don't and still can't see how I made or confirmed any of your points and I've been to more than one county fair & a goat ropping contest. Maybe I need a translator.
Enough said from this end = I ain't go'nna say no mo"

HAHAHAHA.....FUNNY, FUNNY. Never in 13 years have I seen a mast CRACK. Bearings go out, yes. Mast....no. I have seen out riggers get bent from side impacts but have also seen that on Crowns. It's called OPERATOR DAMAGE not manufacturing defect. BTW, I've always touched up the skirts on ALL my customers lifts, armor all'd the dash, etc., no matter what the brand. Keeps the operators and customers happy with their equipment. What customer wants to have a big wig tour through a warehouse full of scratched up, beat up lift no matter how much work their getting done. As a matter of fact just bought 3 cases each of Daewoo yellow and Clark green for my sit downs. Ofcourse, in this case their my trucks but I want em looking good. I'm guessing when you cut yourself Hyster yellow comes gushing out?

By the way,Mr.FORMER certified red tech.I was at a huge warehouse where a few red reach trucks appeared.The masts made metal and cracked from day one.The outriggers bent and twisted inside of a year.Those 50,000 hour Hysters never had those problems.They got in the door because they were cheap.
I have noticed red technicians do a lot of painting.Every time they P.M. a truck ( one of theirs only ). Paint ,paint ,paint.What are they covering up anyway? I personally think it is a psyco / illusion their management came up with so their trucks appear to be holding up.

Thank you for helping me make my point.