Newspaper Article – Invention turns motorbike into forklift

Invention turns motorbike into forklift

By Geoff Mercer
Staff reporter, Hastings

Three and four-wheel motorbikes can now be forklifts, thanks to a recent invention.

Hastings orchadist [orchardist] and businessman Doug Hill has built a forklift he can attach to a three or four-wheel motorbike to carry 450kg bins of fruit.

Mr Hill said that after discussion in the Hill Corporation workshop about whether it would work, a prototype hoist was “knocked up” at the start of the Golden Queen peach season and had operated faultlessly since.

Mr Hill said that the trailer-mounted forklift had shifted about 450 full bins around the company’s orchard.

The operator lowers the fork hoist to almost ground level, reverses it into the base of the bin, lifts it and drives off. The hydraulics are driven by an electric pump powered by an independent battery, which is kept charged by the motorbike. The control switch is mounted on the motorbike.

Mr Hill said he did not know of any other implement enabling three and four-wheel motorbikes, now common on orchards, to shift bins of fruit.

“The big thing about it is it’s so quick and easy.”

“Heavy tractors running around orchards when it’s wet are a real problem.”

The motorbike fork-hoist trailer enables him to “tip-toe” bins across the orchard easily in the wet without damaging ground surface.

The only drawback identified so far was the need to reverse it down rows of trees to collect bins if tree spacings prevented U-turning from one row to another. However, it was easy to back.

If a market existed, Hill Corporation’s engineers would manufacture the hoist, which could be improved with the addition of cushioning in the hydraulic ram to minimise bruising, Mr Hill said.

It would “probably” cost about $2500, the hydraulics being the most expensive item.

Photo caption – Mr Hill with the prototype orchard bin transporter he can operate from his three-wheel motorbike.