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SCP UK has risen to the challenge of maintaining previous stock levels in a smaller warehouse footprint with the help of an Aisle-Master articulated forklift at one of its UK sites. The company is part of SCP Distributors LLC (Poolcorp) based in Louisiana which is the world's largest wholesale distributor of swimming pool supplies, equipment, spas, and related leisure products which has around 80,000 global customers, 290 locations and 3,200 employees.

Following a strategic rationalisation of the premises near London's Gatwick Airport, Warehouse Manager Joe Taylor had 26,700 ft ² at his disposal rather than 41,000 ft² for the storage of large items such as hot tubs, spas and pallets of auxiliary equipment such as gas heaters, pumps and filters. The only way to create the required capacity in the new area was to find a truck that would work in narrow aisles indoors, and which was also capable of offloading in the yard. The Aisle-Master, manufactured by parent Irish company Combilift fitted the bill perfectly.

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"The limited manoeuvrability of our old reach truck would have meant having aisle widths of around 6m for some of our larger loads which are 8ft square," says Joe. "This was obviously not going to be viable in the space available, but by replacing it with the Aisle-Master we were able to put racking much closer together. We have achieved an impressive total of 760 pallet spaces plus 120 bays for storing hot tubs."

Deliveries arrive on site in rigid trailers or containers so any handling equipment needs to negotiate the fairly steep rear ramp for offloading and loading. The Aisle-Master's powerful AC drive motor easily copes with this, for seamless and quick movement of products from the vehicle directly into the warehouse and into racks and bays. Access into the trailers is no problem due to the four stage mast with a low closed height, which can then extend to 5600mm to deposit pallets into the highest racking inside.

Features such as telescopic forks and hydraulic fork positioners make light work of handling SCP's diverse sized loads, and the positioners are of great benefit to operators as driver Aaron Green explains: "Adjusting the forks from within the cab reduces manual effort and enables a quicker turnaround as we don't need to jump in and out of the truck every time we switch from handling pallets to hot tubs for example."

SPC had not used an articulated truck before but chose the Aisle-Master brand as Joe and his team were impressed by its robust build and testimony from existing customers as to its extreme reliability. It has certainly delivered the goods when it comes to squeezing the maximum volume into the space available, and payback on investment will be quickly achieved when the lower

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operational costs of the smaller warehouse are factored in.

Aisle-Masters have capacities of up to 2.5 tonnes, and now offer lift heights of up to 15 metres, with a choice of AC electric or LPG power. A recent addition to the range is the cold store model developed specifically for the exacting requirements of this sector, able to work in temperatures as low as -30° C. Features incorporated into the new fully enclosed, high visibility cab include heated cab windows which eliminate the build-up of condensation when driving between different temperatures in a building, allocated areas in the cab for the use of a bar code scanner and a 48 Volt heater.

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The narrow 15E model was also introduced last year, with a chassis width of just 1030mm and a 1.5t capacity. This is ideal for handling lighter loads in low bay applications and also offers the ability to block stack.

All Aisle-Masters are developed, designed and built at the dedicated production facility in Monaghan, Ireland, and can be customised for individual requirements. Aisle-Master design engineers also offer site visit and logistic planning services, supplying free layout proposals illustrating how to maximise the use of available storage space.


Aisle-Master Ltd. Co. Monaghan, Ireland
HQ Tel: 00353 47 80400
North America: 1877 266 2456
Germany: 0800 000 5764
Australia: 1300 552 422
UK: 07870 976 758

E: info@aisle-master.com W: www.aisle-master.com

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