Isoloader dual RTG's carrying Wind Towers, Tasmania.

Straddle carriers are not just for handling shipping containers, they are often used to handle heavy, long or bulky industrial loads. From pre-cast concrete segments through to aluminium ingots and cable reels Isoloader has a vast amount of experience in Heavy Load handling.

Isoloaders' first machines were designed specifically for handling large diameter lengths of pipe for dam construction and hydro electric projects. These machines were also constructed for use on unsealed surfaces. Since then, although our company has been primarily focussed on and perhaps best known for machines for use in container handling operations, we are regularly called upon to provide customised lifting solutions for loads in excess of 50T and out of gauge loads. Our most recent examples of longer heavier loads come from bridge construction projects for handling pre-cast concrete beams. Learn more here.


Isoloader Heavy Lifters lifting and manoeuvring precast bridge sections, UAE.
Recent machine deliveries for Isoloader include 3 off 50T Aluminium ingot carriers for Rio Tinto in Canada. The machines are based on Isoloader's proven Transporter range of high-performance straddle carriers. The Ingot Carriers handle 24 individual bundles of ingots as a single load, weighing a total of 26t. The Ingot Carriers unload the trucks bringing the ingots down from the casting lines, place them in the dockside storage yard and bring them to the ship cranes during loading.

For this project Isoloader has gone to great lengths to include unsurpassed ease of operation, operator comfort and specific climatic optimization features. Inclusions such as high quality seating, remote closed circuit load monitoring, acoustic insulation and winterizing features including air conditioning, thermal insulation and high visibility indicators have been key inclusions necessary for operation in this harsh marine environment in temperatures often as low as -18°C.

Applying Lessons Learnt

For more than 40 years Isoloader has been well known for pioneering the use of straddles to handle containers in smaller terminals, intermodal facilities and factories where the lower volumes require a low Total Cost of Ownership to justify the investment. Isoloader is also well known in the heavy lifting sector, leveraging those innovations learned in handling containers.

Isoloader has also had to develop a range of technologies specifically focused on the heavy lift market, solving problems ranging from manoeuvrability through to custom manipulations through to handling extra-long loads. With these technologies and our range of single beam and double beam RTGs and Straddle Carriers, including our Transporter, Econolifter and EZLift straddles.

Instances where a load is quite long, or where lifting points are far apart such as wind towers, pipe or cast concrete beams may induce considerations similar to those as if lifting very heavy items. Isoloader has proven and cost effective solutions for a wide range of industrial load handling applications up to 200 tonnes and lengths greater than 20m. Learn more here.

Extra long loads

For loads over 20m in length, Isoloader's straddle carriers and rubber tyred gantries (RTG) can be configured to work in tandem, using either synchronized or independent controls. Dual machines can be used to handle long structures such as pre-cast concrete segments used for bridges, or for pylons and towers. The maximum length is limited by the rigidity of the structure to be handled.

The machines can be controlled independently or they can be linked using synchronized control for control by a single operator.

Optional wireless controls give the operator the freedom of to move about the machine. Optional steering modes such as lateral crab (sideways movement) are supported for tandem operations


Isoloader Heavy Lifters used in tandem for precast concrete beams, Brisbane QLD Australia
Load Manipulation

Isoloader's range of straddle carriers and rubber tyred gantries (RTG) can be leveraged to not only lift and transport containers and heavy loads, but also to grab and manipulate them. Straddling the load facilitates a wide range of manipulations including rotating, inverting, tipping and squeezing. Isoloader configures and customizes our equipment to give you an engineered solution that optimizes the Total Cost per Load Handled for your specific application. Learn more here

Inverting - heavy loads such as 50 tonne pre-cast concrete rail segments at Prefarail's Belgian production facility, can be rotated about the longitudinal axis, turning the load upside down.

Isoloader Heavy Lifter at Prefarail, Belgium
Tipping - containers can be tipped up to 50 degrees using either straddle carriers or RTGs for dumping and filling bulk materials. At RCM's Canadian containerized waste management and composting facility, a straddle is used to do both, placing the containers on to angled racks for filling, dumping the material out onto the floor in the curing shed, as well as transporting and stacking the containers 2 high.

Spinning - rubber tyred gantries have the span to rotate the load about the vertical axis, as required in intermodal terminals prior to loading the containers on to trucks.


Isoloader Gantry - Rotating 40' Containers
Precise positioning - positive displacement hydrostatic drives with negligible backlash and independent side-shift or cross-travel drives, allow the precise positioning of the load including angular trim in both the horizontal and vertical.
Custom grab and squeeze - for loads that cannot be lifted with conventional lift-pockets or lift points, Isoloader has a range of grab arms that can reach and lift the load from a bottom lip, such as when handling swap bodies. Lateral pressure can be used to squeeze and align the load, as required when handling multiple bundles of ingots as a single load.


Isoloader Heavy Lifters for Aluminium Ingot Handling using ingot grabs.
After 40+ years of operation we are delighted to come full circle to today where we have been commissioned to design a rough terrain pipe handler. The machine is used to install 2m diameter steel water pipe direct from the truck into the trench. Inclusions on this machine include rotation and levelling systems to facilitate pipe welding in the trench and possibly in a world first on a straddle we have incorporated tracks to cope with limited traction on soft and slippery terrain.

Contact: AU +61 2 6658 1333; EU +33 6 29 07 26 57; US +1 760 621 3830,
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