Loading a Flatbed on a Cambered Yard
You are loading 1,000 kg bundles of timber onto a flatbed trailer from a stack in the yard. The trailer deck is 1.3 m high and the bundles are 4.8 m long. The yard has a noticeable camber toward a surface water drain, and the trailer is parked with its offside wheels close to the drain channel. The machine is a 14 m telehandler with forks, charted at 3,500 kg at 4 m and 2,500 kg at 6 m, level ground. The stack is 5.5 m from the front tyres at the closest point. The trailer driver is standing on the deck guiding you in with hand signals. The bundles are banded but one band on the top bundle is loose.
1. Identify the stability and load-handling issues in this loading operation and explain how each affects the lift.
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Camber and drain proximity. The trailer's offside wheels are near the drain, so the deck may be tilted and the ground under the machine may slope toward the drain. A cambered yard means the chart's 'level ground' assumption is not met, and the trailer deck tilt adds a further slope the load must be landed on. The load's centre of gravity shifts downhill and the machine's stability margin reduces on that side.
Reach. At 5.5 m the interpolated capacity is about 2,750 kg (halfway between 3,500 kg at 4 m and 2,500 kg at 6 m). A 1,000 kg bundle is well inside that, so capacity is not the limiting factor - stability and control are.
Driver on the deck. A person standing on the trailer deck while a 1,000 kg bundle is swung over them is in a crush and fall zone. The driver should guide from the ground at a safe distance, not from the deck.
Loose band. A loose band on the top bundle means the bundle may not stay together as it is lifted and landed. It could shed timber onto the deck, the driver or the ground.
2. Set out the sequence you would follow to load the bundles safely, and say what you would refuse to do.
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- Stop and reassess the position. Move the trailer or the machine so the trailer is on firm, level ground away from the drain, or confirm with a competent person that the camber is within the machine's limits. Do not load across a camber with the trailer tilted toward a drain.
- Get the driver off the deck. Ask them to guide from the ground at a safe distance, outside the swing zone and the fall zone.
- Deal with the loose band. Re-band or reject the top bundle before lifting. Do not lift a bundle that may come apart in the air.
- Confirm the mass of each bundle and check it against the chart at the actual reach and ground condition.
- Lift and land each bundle squarely on the deck, keeping the load low and the boom retracted as far as possible, with the machine square to the trailer.
- Secure each bundle on the deck before the next lift.
Refuse: loading with the driver on the deck, loading across the camber toward the drain without reassessment, and lifting the bundle with the loose band.