An aerial work platform, also known as a bucket truck, is a device which provides transitory accessibility to individuals or hardware in inaccessible places, often at elevated levels. Various kinds of these aerial platforms exist and some specialised kinds are either called cherry pickers or scissor lifts.
Truck mounted cherry pickers differ from permanent access lifters like elevators, due to the fact that they are mostly used for flexible transitory access purposes. They are regularly used by construction workers or by firemen in emergency cases which require immediate access. By design, they are mostly operated by one individual and are capable of lifting limited weights.
Furthermore, these elevated platforms are sometimes built with electric plugs or compressed air connectors. Some are even custom designed with mechanical parts for transporting frames for glasses.
The initial purpose for the invention of cherry pickers in 1944, by Jay Eitel, was for the picking of cherries. The motivating factor for this invention was due to the frustration of spending hours on a ladder picking cherries. Nine years later, he successfully established the Telsta Corporation, the first manufacturers of the cherry picker, thus paving the way for more evolutionary advancements.
Socage: Integrating Technology in Truck Mounted Aerial Platforms
Socage is one of the world’s most efficient manufacturers of bucket lift trucks. Their objective is to continuously seek innovative ways aimed at improving and multiplying the use of aerial platforms, while expanding their reach to industries yet to be explored.
In a bid to offer reliable and more efficient services to its users, the company has integrated technology into its business by creating a platform, which they refer to as the Socage Academy.
The Socage Academy is a platform which allows clients to learn how to operate and effortlessly use the company’s bucket lift trucks. The goal of this innovative solution is to enable their users to intuitively understand the workings of their products.
At the Academy, a client can find video manuals explaining the utilisation process of their aerial platforms. Each of the company’s bucket lift trucks has a QR code, and all a client needs to do to gain automatic access to the video manuals is to simply scan the code.
To further guarantee the safety of their clients, the company included a SPEED stabilisation solution. The purpose of this solution is to improve the stability of their truck mounted aerial platforms. With a single click from the basket controls, automatic stabilisation and locking of the aerial part is achieved. This reduces the occurrence of accidents.
Unlike traditional stabilisation systems which require extra time and manoeuvres to gain stability, the company’s automatic SPEED solution provides an increase in the productivity of the platforms with better stability in less time and proper safety conditions.
Conclusion
Over the years, the usefulness of cherry pickers, witnessed an evolution, as people began using it as a device to access higher ground levels. With more companies keying into the manufacturing processes of these devices, the need to stand out, by integrating innovation and technology became necessary. Socage Academy, with its expanding innovative solutions has proven to be amongst the best manufacturers of truck mounted aerial platforms in the world.