A hand pallet truck is about as simple as powered handling equipment gets, which is exactly why it gets neglected until it stops working. This guide covers pallet truck servicing, repair and routine maintenance — service intervals, wheels and load rollers, hydraulic oil, seal kits, the faults you can fix yourself, and the ones worth paying someone for.
One thing up front, because it shapes everything below: we sell pallet trucks, we do not repair them. If you have arrived here looking for a pallet truck repair engineer, skip to finding a repair engineer and we will point you in a sensible direction rather than waste your time. If you want to keep your own fleet running — or work out whether the one in the corner is worth fixing — the rest of this is written for you.
For how to operate a pallet truck, pre-use checks and training, see our separate guide to using a pallet truck safely. This page is about keeping it working.
How often should a pallet truck be serviced?
There is no statutory service interval for a hand pallet truck the way there is an MOT for a van. What there is, in practice, is a three-tier rhythm that most well-run sites converge on:
- Daily, by the operator, before use. Thirty seconds. Forks lift and lower fully; nothing leaking; wheels and rollers turn freely and are not flat-spotted; no cracks at the fork tips or the A-frame; handle and lever move through all three positions.
- Monthly to quarterly, by someone competent. Grease the linkage, axles and pivot points; check the oil level; check wheel and roller wear properly rather than by eye from standing height; check fixings; check the load plate is still legible.
- Annually, a documented inspection. A full functional check, load test if your risk assessment calls for it, and a written record. On a single-truck site this can reasonably be done in-house by a competent person; on a fleet, it is usually a contract.
Adjust that upward for hard use. A truck doing sixty pallets a shift on a rough yard surface needs more attention than one that moves four pallets a week on a smooth warehouse floor. Cold stores, wash-down areas and anywhere with chemical exposure all shorten intervals.
Pallet truck wheels and load rollers
Wheels are the single most-searched pallet truck part, and with good reason: they wear out first, they are the most common reason a truck feels wrong, and they are the repair most likely to be worth doing yourself.
Every hand pallet truck has two sets:
- Steering wheels — the larger pair under the handle, typically around 180–200 mm diameter. Across our own range these run 200 × 50 mm on the stainless and reel-handling trucks, and 180 × 50 mm or 180 × 55 mm on the weigh-scale and electric high-lift models.
- Load rollers — the small wheels at the fork tips, usually in tandem pairs, around 74–82 mm diameter. Ours run 80 × 70 mm nylon front rollers on the stainless truck, 82 × 70 mm roller tandems on the reel-handling truck, 74 × 70 mm tandem rollers on the weigh-scale range and 75 × 50 mm on the high-lift.
Nylon or polyurethane?
This is the choice that matters, and it is not a quality ladder — it is a floor-surface decision.
Nylon is hard, rolls with very little effort, carries high loads and shrugs off water and chemicals. That is why it is specified on our galvanised and stainless trucks, which are built for wet and damp conditions. The trade-off is that hard wheels are noisy, they transmit every joint and crack straight into the load, and on a poor floor they will chip and flat-spot. Nylon also marks softer floor coatings.
Polyurethane is softer. It grips better, runs quieter, absorbs surface imperfections and is kinder to painted and sealed floors — which is why it is on our weigh-scale trucks, where a bouncing load is a bad reading, and on the 5 tonne fully powered truck, where quiet stable running matters. It wears faster than nylon under heavy continuous load and it does not like sustained chemical exposure.
Rule of thumb: smooth sealed floor and a need to protect it, go polyurethane. Rough concrete, wet areas, or maximum load with minimum push effort, go nylon.
When to replace wheels and rollers
Replace when you see any of these, not when the wheel finally seizes:
- Flat spots. A wheel dragged sideways under load develops a flat that you feel as a thump every revolution. It will not recover.
- The tread worn down towards the hub. On a bonded wheel, running it to the metal wrecks the bearing housing as well as the wheel.
- Bearing play or noise. Rock the wheel by hand; if it moves on its axle, the bearing has gone. Bearings are cheap and are often the actual fault when a wheel "won't turn".
- Anything wound round the axle. Strapping, shrink wrap and baler twine are the number-one cause of a stiff wheel. Cut it out before assuming the worst.
Replace load rollers in pairs, and steering wheels in pairs. A new wheel next to a worn one puts the truck out of level, which loads the frame unevenly and drags the load off centre.
Hydraulic oil, bleeding and the lever
The pump on a hand pallet truck is a closed hydraulic circuit: the handle pumps oil into a cylinder, the cylinder pivots the linkage, the forks rise. Almost every lifting fault is somewhere in that loop.
Oil level and grade. Use the hydraulic oil the manufacturer specifies — typically a light hydraulic oil in the ISO 32 to 46 range for general use, with a lower-viscosity grade for cold store work where standard oil thickens and the truck lifts sluggishly. Overfilling is a real fault, not a harmless excess: too much oil leaves nowhere for the air, and the truck will not reach full lift.
Air in the system is the most common cause of a truck that lifts partially, spongily, or in fits and starts — particularly after transport on its side, or after an oil top-up. Bleeding it out is usually straightforward: with no load on the forks, set the lever to lower, then pump the handle vigorously fifteen to twenty times. That cycles the oil and pushes trapped air back to the reservoir. Repeat if the lift is still soft.
The three-position lever is the answer more often than anyone admits. Lift, neutral and lower — and a truck "that won't lift" is very frequently a truck left in the lower position, or one whose lever cable has stretched so that "neutral" is really "slightly lowering". Before you diagnose anything hydraulic, check the lever is doing what the label says. On our reel-handling truck the three-position control gives fingertip operation with the handle at any angle; on a worn truck, cable adjustment at the handle end restores it.
Common faults and likely causes
The truck won't lift, or lifts only part-way
In order of likelihood: lever in the wrong position or out of adjustment; air in the hydraulics (bleed as above); low oil; overfilled oil; overload relief valve doing its job because the load exceeds capacity or is badly off-centre; worn pump seals. The first four are yours; the last is a seal kit or an engineer.
The forks sink or creep down under load
Oil is escaping past a seal or a valve seat inside the cylinder, or dirt is holding a valve fractionally open. Sometimes a full lift-and-lower cycle a few times will flush the debris clear. If it persists, it is a seal kit. Do not carry on using a truck that creeps — a load descending unexpectedly is a foot injury.
The forks won't lower
Usually lever adjustment or a stuck release valve; occasionally a bent fork or damaged linkage binding mechanically. Lower the load onto blocks before investigating, never with the load in the air.
Stiff steering or dragging wheels
Check for debris wound round the axles first — it is the cause far more often than wear. Then bearings, then wheel wear, then a dry pivot that needs greasing. A truck that pulls to one side under load usually has one worn or seized load roller.
Oil leaks
Trace it to the source before topping up. A weep at the ram shaft is a rod seal; a leak at a joint may just be a fitting to nip up; oil at the base of the pump body is a bigger job. Any leak is also a slip hazard and, on a food or clean site, a contamination issue.
Bent or splayed forks
Almost always from lifting a load well off centre, or from driving the forks into something. Bent forks are not a repair — they are the end of the truck. Straightening structural steel that has already yielded does not restore its strength, it just hides the damage.
How much does it cost to repair a pallet truck?
This is the most-asked question in the search results for pallet truck repair, and remarkably few of the firms answering that search publish a price. We are not a repair company, so we cannot quote you one honestly — and we are not going to invent a figure.
What we can do is give you the framework that actually decides it, because the question underneath "what will this cost?" is nearly always "is it worth fixing?". Work it out against the replacement cost, which is a number we do know:
- £80–£250 — budget and DIY-grade trucks. Below roughly £250, a callout charge alone will often exceed the value of the truck. These are effectively disposable; replace rather than repair unless the fault is a wheel set or a bleed.
- £250–£400 — standard trade trucks. A wheel set, a seal kit or a bleed is worth doing. A cylinder or pump replacement usually is not.
- £1,300–£1,900 — specialist trucks. Our own range sits here — the reel-handling truck at £1,302.66, stainless at £1,564.50, weigh-scale from £1,589.88. At this level, almost any repair short of a bent chassis is worth doing, and a service contract makes obvious sense.
- £1,400–£15,000 — powered trucks. Repair is nearly always the right answer economically. The exception is a lead-acid battery pack at end of life, which can be a substantial fraction of the truck's value on its own.
The honest general rule: parts you can fit yourself — wheels, load rollers, bearings, seal kits, oil — are almost always worth it on anything above the disposable tier. Labour-heavy internal hydraulic work rarely pays on a cheap truck and almost always pays on an expensive one. And a bent fork, a cracked A-frame or a distorted chassis ends the conversation whatever the truck cost.
Parts, seal kits and spares
The parts that actually get replaced on a hand pallet truck are a short list: steering wheels, load rollers, bearings, the hydraulic seal kit, the release-lever cable, and the handle grip. Everything else is either the chassis or the pump assembly.
Two practical points. First, measure before you order — wheel diameter, width and bore, plus axle length. A 200 × 50 mm steering wheel and a 180 × 50 mm one are not interchangeable, and bore sizes vary between manufacturers who otherwise look identical. Second, seal kits are model-specific. A generic kit that "fits most" frequently does not, and a half-fitted cylinder is a truck out of action for a fortnight rather than an afternoon.
We supply complete trucks rather than spares. For parts, go to the manufacturer or to a pallet truck specialist who stocks for your model.
Finding a pallet truck repair engineer
We sell pallet trucks; we do not service or repair them, and we do not hire them. If you need someone to come out, three routes work:
- Your forklift service provider. If you already have a forklift contract, pallet trucks are usually a trivial add-on and the engineer is on site anyway. This is almost always the cheapest route and the one most people overlook.
- A dedicated pallet truck repair firm. There is a genuine national network of these, most working regionally, many offering on-site service and a fleet-inspection contract. They are usually far quicker and cheaper than a manufacturer for a mechanical fault.
- The manufacturer or their dealer. The right answer for a powered truck under warranty, for anything with a controller or battery-management fault, and where you need original parts and a documented history.
Whichever you choose, ask what the callout covers, whether they carry common parts on the van, and what happens to the record — you want the inspection written down, not just the invoice.
Powered pallet trucks need more than this
Everything above applies to a powered truck too, plus a whole second maintenance domain that a hand truck simply does not have: the battery and charger, the drive motor and gearbox, the brakes, the controller and the emergency reverse belly button.
The big one is the battery. A lead-acid pack that is routinely part-charged will not reach its rated life, and partial charging is the single most common way sites destroy an expensive battery. Lithium is far more tolerant of opportunity charging, which is why the VULCAN fully powered range uses it. Either way, the charger is part of the asset and belongs in the maintenance schedule with everything else.
Brakes and the emergency reverse are safety-critical and need checking as such — not annually, but as part of the routine. For the wider picture, see our guides to electric pallet trucks and manual versus electric, or browse powered pallet trucks and lithium battery pallet trucks.
Weigh-scale trucks carry a third requirement again: the load cells need calibration to stay accurate, and a truck used for trade weighing has its own legal metrology obligations. Our weigh scale pallet truck guide and the weigh scale range cover that properly.
Your legal duties — and the LOLER question
Under PUWER, work equipment must be maintained in efficient working order and in good repair, inspected where safety depends on the installation or conditions, and the inspection recorded. That is the duty that makes routine maintenance a legal matter rather than good housekeeping, and it applies to a £150 pallet truck as much as a £15,000 one.
Whether LOLER's thorough examination regime also applies to a hand pallet truck is genuinely contested — a pallet truck does lift a load, but only around 100 mm and only to move it. Some duty holders put pallet trucks on a twelve-month thorough examination; others manage them under PUWER inspection alone. We set out the arguments on both sides in our guide to using a pallet truck safely rather than repeat them here. What is not in doubt either way: daily checks, efficient working order, a documented periodic inspection, and records you can produce.
If you also run racking, the inspection duty there is much more clearly defined — see warehouse racking inspection.
When to stop repairing and replace
Replace, don't repair, when any of these are true: the forks are bent, splayed or cracked; the A-frame or chassis is distorted; the capacity plate is missing and cannot be verified; the repair cost approaches half the replacement price on a mid-range truck; or the truck has been repaired repeatedly for the same fault, which usually means the underlying cause was never the part you kept changing.
And one that gets missed: if the truck was the wrong specification all along, repairing it just extends the mistake. A standard truck failing repeatedly in a wash-down area wants a stainless or galvanised truck; one struggling on a yard wants a rough terrain truck; one being asked to lift to working height wants a high lift truck or a stacker; one carrying reels wants a reel handling truck. Browse the full pallet truck range or the manual pallet trucks if it is time.
Frequently asked questions
Why won't my pallet truck lift?
Check the control lever first — a truck left in the lower position will not lift, and a stretched lever cable can leave it partially lowering when it looks neutral. Then bleed the hydraulics: with no load, set the lever to lower and pump the handle fifteen to twenty times. Then check the oil level; both low and overfilled cause partial lift. If none of that works, it is worn pump seals and needs a seal kit.
Why does my pallet truck slowly lower under load?
Oil is passing a seal or a valve seat, or grit is holding a valve slightly open. Cycling the truck fully up and down a few times sometimes clears debris. If it keeps creeping, take it out of service and fit a seal kit — a load coming down on its own is a foot-injury waiting to happen.
How often should a pallet truck be serviced?
Daily pre-use checks by the operator, a monthly to quarterly greasing and wear check by a competent person, and a documented annual inspection. Shorten those intervals for heavy use, rough surfaces, cold stores and wash-down environments.
How much does it cost to repair a pallet truck?
UK repair firms rarely publish prices, and it depends heavily on the fault and whether the engineer comes to you. The useful question is whether repair is worth it: below about £250 of replacement value a truck is effectively disposable; between £250 and £400 wheels, bearings and seal kits are worth doing but major hydraulic work generally is not; above roughly £1,000 almost any repair short of structural damage pays.
How do I free up stiff steering?
Look for shrink wrap, strapping or twine wound round the axles before anything else — it is the most common cause by a distance. Then check the bearings for play, the wheels for flat spots, and grease the steering pivot and linkage.
What wheels does a pallet truck use?
Two sets: steering wheels of roughly 180–200 mm under the handle, and small load rollers of roughly 74–82 mm in tandem pairs at the fork tips. Nylon is hard, low-rolling-resistance and suits wet or rough conditions; polyurethane is softer, quieter and kinder to sealed floors. Always replace in pairs.
What hydraulic oil does a pallet truck take?
A light hydraulic oil, typically in the ISO 32 to 46 range, unless the manufacturer specifies otherwise. Use a lower-viscosity grade for cold store work, where standard oil thickens and the truck lifts sluggishly. Do not overfill — too much oil prevents the forks reaching full lift.
Are pallet trucks covered by LOLER?
Interpretations genuinely differ. A pallet truck lifts a load, but only about 100 mm and only in order to move it, and duty holders take different views on whether that brings it within LOLER's thorough examination regime or leaves it under PUWER inspection. What is not disputed is that PUWER applies: the truck must be maintained in efficient working order, inspected, and the inspections recorded. Settle the LOLER question with your competent person or insurer rather than assuming either way.