Perhaps you´re buying chinese machines and you dont know... All of the largest brands of the world are manufacturing in China, and, in fact, selling equipment of those companies you have looked down on

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I don't think there is an obvious top 5, but I think there is a quite obvious top 3:

Maximal, Hangcha & Heli

I'd consider these three manufacturers the "best value Chinese forklifts" and I think there is quite a gap between these three and the rest.

Each of these three have been around long enough to have developed the manufacturing scale, quality control, logistics and dealer network to not only build a good value forklifts but deliver it in a professional and timely manner with spare parts support.

According to the latest Chinese export figures these three are actually the biggest and fastest growing Chinese forklift exporters by some margin now and many of the smaller manufacturers are actually starting to get fewer exports...

I suspect this is because the Chinese forklift industry is probably beginning to consolidate into a couple of key manufacturers just like the Japanese industry did back in the day and the good manufacturers are winning an increasing share of the exports.

Plus these are probably the only three that have been exporting forklifts for long enough to have built a reputation for being decent quality units.

These days I'd actually be really careful of buying anything other than these three because if the Chinese forklift industry is consolidating into a few key players you'd probably want to be buying your forklift off one of the big three who will definitely be around in 10 years time.

So if it was me, I'd be avoiding the other manufacturers like GoodSense, Lonking, EP, Feeler, UN, Teu, Wecan, etc.

Just my two cents.