All About Utility Skates: Part 2: Non-Tilting Utility Skates

As we discussed in our last post, Hevi-Haul utility skates deliver incredible strength, rugged reliability, smooth motion, and versatility to adapt to a variety of tasks. We covered all the proper applications for our tilt-type utility skates, and in this post, we’ll continue with the features and benefits of the non-tilting variety of utility skate.

As with the tilting variety, non-tilting utility skates are the world’s most versatile machinery moving dollies on the market, ideal for both turning and straight line moving applications. Non-tilting utility skates boast the same features and benefits of the tilt-type skates, but in a more rigid design with extra support rollers, while retaining much of the climbing and terrain-handling abilities of the tilting skates.

Non-tilt utility skates combine the stability and increased load capacities of our larger straight line skates with the improved climbing and leading inherent to our the tilt-type models. Each skate is equipped with four 3-1/2″ Ø center support rollers and two 3-1/4″ Ø front and rear rollers, one on each end. The extra support rollers do not allow for tilting, however, they maintain their climbing functionality and ability to move over uneven floors, welds, tracks, gaps, and more. Non-tilt utility skates are available in two varieties, rigid and swivel, that can be combined in numerous configurations for various moving needs.

Rigid top non-tilt utility skates were designed to be combined with their swivel top counterparts as rear following dollies. They are also often used separately for straight line moves and wider arcing turns where swivel top skates are not required.

Swivel top non-tilt utility skates were designed to be combined with their rigid top counterparts as the lead dollies for turning applications. They are also often used separately for heavy loads requiring full directional control. Each swivel top skate has a friction plate between the top frame of the dolly and bottom surface of the swivel plate to reduce swimming under load and eliminating the need for a locking mechanism. Swivel tops are easily removable with a hex key wrench for straight line moving applications without the need to purchase additional skates.

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Hevi-Haul Skates have been trusted by professional rigging companies and machinery movers for over 80 years as the premiere family owned American brand machinery dolly. Contact us today for a personal answer to all your inquiries.

All About Utility Skates: Part 1: Tilting Utility Skates

When you need a skate that delivers incredible strength, rugged reliability, smooth motion, and versatility to adapt to a variety of tasks, there is no better answer for you than utility skates. If the skates you are looking for need to be the best on the market to ensure quality performance year after year, then there is no better answer for your needs than Hevi-Haul utility skates. We build these versatile and capable products with design superiority and manufacturing excellence, ensuring that every utility skate that leaves our line is the highest quality skate available. It’s important to know what you need when it comes to utility skates, and whether tilting utility skates or non-tilting utility skates are the best choice for your application. In this post, we’ll delve into the features and benefits of the tilting variety of utility skate.

Utility Skates are the world’s most versatile machinery moving dollies on the market, ideal for both turning and straight line moving applications. Capacities range from 1.5 tons to 37.5 tons per skate, rolling on interchangeable steel or polyurethane coated rollers. Fully welded steel frames bring the ruggedness and unmatched quality you know and expect from Hevi-Haul. A wide stance provides increased stability and weight distribution under load. Their low profile design allows for minimum load jacking and maximum load clearance. Hevi-Haul skates have been trusted by professional rigging companies and machinery movers for over 80 years as the premiere family owned American brand machinery dolly.

Tilt-type utility skates are our most maneuverable machinery dollies. With the exception of some lighter duty models, each roller dolly is equipped with two 3-1/2″ Ø center support rollers and two 3-1/4″ Ø front and rear rollers, one on each end. This wheel layout provides a tilting axis that provides exceptional turning ability and easier moving over uneven floors, welds, tracks, gaps, up ramps and more. Each skate can turn on its own radius.

Tilt-type utility skates are available in two varieties, rigid and swivel, that can be combined in numerous configurations for various moving needs. Rigid top tilt-type utility skates were designed to be combined with their swivel top counterparts as rear following dollies. With their excellent maneuverability, they are also often used separately for straight line moves and wider arcing turns where swivel top skates are not necessary.

Swivel top tilt-type utility skates designed to be combined with their rigid top counterparts as the lead dollies for turning applications. With their excellent maneuverability, they are also often used separately for heavy loads requiring full directional control. Each swivel top skate has a friction plate between the top frame of the dolly and bottom surface of the swivel plate to reduce swimming under load and eliminating the need for a locking mechanism.

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What Makes Hevi-Haul Bearings the Best?

Hevi-Haul’s extensive line of skates, dollies, and structural moving equipment is designed to be rugged and durable from the ground up. Our component parts are manufactured to be the best on the market, and that superior design and construction lead to the exceptional performance of our assembled products. In particular, the bearings that are in each Hevi-Haul product are exceptionally designed and expertly manufactured.

Hevi-Haul skates us a universal bearing system across all standard model skates. We manufacture free-floating, case-hardened needle bearings and build them into each Hevi-Haul roller. The rollers, available in steel or poly, each house a total of 15 bearings, ensuring smooth motion and rugged durability. We also sell replacement bearings by the set, each containing 15 bearings, or enough for one roller.

The bearings are held in place by the roller, axle, and washers. Replacement bearings can be easily installed into a roller without having to pack them with grease prior to installing them into the skate. Place a steel or metal dowel that is slightly smaller than the 1-inch diameter of the axle and about half as long as the roller on a sturdy surface. Secondly, take one of your washers and place it over the dowel. Then place the roller over the dowel, through the bore. It doesn’t have to be centered perfectly. Then take the 15 needle bearings, and insert them into the bore of the roller, adjusting so they fall around the dowel. Lastly, slide the roller off the edge of your work surface, making sure to hold the contents of the roller in place with your palm. Now you have a roller with bearings installed, ready to be placed back into the skate.

While Hevi-Haul manufactures rollers and bearings to last for many years of heavy abuse, there are still occasions in which a repair or maintenance may be necessary. By following these instructions, you’ll be completely familiarized with the simple and rugged design of Hevi-Haul products. Once you know that Hevi-Haul’s complete line of products that move the world are built in the USA with precision and manufacturing excellence, you can feel confident with Hevi-Haul skates operating in your facility or on your project.

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How to Maintain Your Machinery Skates

Hevi-Haul Skates require minimal maintenance to ensure a very long life of use in the field. Our rock solid design and expert manufacturing processes result in products that deliver sustained performance for many years. In this post, we’ll discuss maintenance and repair procedures that will help you get the most out of your Hevi-Haul machinery skates, the best machinery skates on the market.

To properly care for your Skates you should always keep rolling surfaces free from debris, evenly distribute the weight across all dollies, and never edge load. Routinely check them over after every move and keep them well greased at all times.

In the event of damage to a roller, axle, or bearing, or just to keep your Hevi-Haul machinery skates operating at peak performance, replacement parts are available for all of our standard products. There are a few guidelines to follow when replacing these parts to help ensure a quick and easy repair process.

To start, we recommend gathering a few tools: a non-marring hammer, a 5/16 or ⅞ diameter steel or wooden dowel that is about 1¾ in. long, a standard 2 in. putty knife, and a 3/16 in. hex key wrench or impact wrench.

To replace a roller, start by removing the old roller. Using your hex key wrench, remove the set screws from the set screw holes on each axle boss. Line up your dowel with the end of the axle, and gently tap it with your hammer until the axle is removed from the boss. Continue to work the axle out of the roller bearing, and remove it from the other boss.

Installing the new parts is simply a reverse of the above. Insert the axle through the first boss, and install a washer on the interior end of the axle. Place the Roller into the cavity and start the axle through the roller. Hold the roller in place with your finger through the opposite boss, and then gently tap with your hammer to slowly push the axle into the bearing. Use your putty knife to work another washer between the roller and boss, and hold it in place with your finger while you tap the axle through. Now, line up the axle and tighten the set screws. The final step is to locate the grease fitting and apply an all-purpose grease to properly lubricate the rollers.

By following these simple steps, you’ve gained a complete understanding of how to repair the simple and ruggedly designed Hevi-Haul machinery skates. With simple maintenance and easy repair, Hevi-Haul skates are designed and manufactured to last a lifetime.

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Hevi-Haul Skates have been trusted by professional rigging companies and machinery movers for over 80 years as the premiere family-owned American brand machinery dolly. Contact us today for a personal answer to all your inquiries.

How Machinery Skates are Made

Since 1938, Hevi-Haul has been manufacturing high-quality industrial dollies and skates as a much-needed tool for machinery movers, riggers, and structural movers. Over the years, we’ve perfected our manufacturing process to fine-tune our products and deliver the strongest, most durable, and overall best machinery skates in the world. Our manufacturing ingenuity allows for a superior product at a fair price for our customers.

While many years of experience and continuous improvement of our operations have led to the high-quality products we ship today, our machinery skates are still built using the basic design we developed many years ago. Let’s take a closer look at what it takes to build the world’s best machinery skates:

Superior processes lead to superior products

Our manufacturing experts pride themselves on the high quality of the products that they ship every day. Our world-class, USA-based manufacturing facility uses state of the art processes and techniques to build what is by nature a fairly simple product.

Hevi-Haul skates start from the ground up – with the rollers. Our steel rollers provide maximum durability and can handle extended resting loads and even permanent installation. They excel in applications with rough or uneven floors. Our polyurethane coated rollers are the ideal choice for floors and rolling surfaces that require maximum protection. Poly rollers are not recommended for extended resting loads or on rough and debris-riddled rolling surfaces.

These high-quality rollers are built to exacting specifications and then pressed onto our 1” diameter CNC machined, high carbon steel axles. Heat treated needle bearings extend the full length of the roller for smooth operation. The extremely durable axles, combined with the needle bearings, ensure smooth and accurate motion of the rollers, and easily accessible grease fittings allow for easy lubrication and minimum maintenance.

The roller assemblies are now ready to be built into the steel frame. Our advanced manufacturing techniques allow for extremely high tolerances, ensuring that our machinery skates fit exact specifications consistently. The steel frame, sourced from high-quality American steel, is welded and fabricated in the USA. Our unique frame features a wide roller stance, which allows our skates to easily bridge cracks, gaps and holes in floors, and steel cleats on the top of the skates which embed themselves into wood skids or blocking to ensure alignment and grip.

Once the frame is fully assembled with the rollers in place, each skate is thoroughly inspected and tested for the highest quality. The finished skates are then packaged and sent to our customer, ready to move even the heaviest of loads with ease and reliability.

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Custom Skates for Unique Applications

Unique problems require unique solutions. When a load needs to be relocated, and our traditional line of load-moving products isn’t appropriate, we go back to the drawing board. Hevi-Haul is your expert in the best products to move heavy machinery, structures, and materials, and our deep knowledge of building products that move the world can develop a custom solution to your unique load-moving problem.

How do we do this? With a blend of new technology and old-fashioned experience. Our talented engineers will assess your project and situation, and our team will design a custom load-moving product to perfectly address your needs. With over 80 years of experience in custom roller dollies, we use our expertise and the latest in 3D CAD software and technology to design the best one of a kind rugged skates in a myriad of varieties.

Whether it’s a modification to our standard skates or a custom solution, we will work directly with you through the design process to model a product that fits your requirements prior to production. We involve you in the process, ensuring that you have our full confidence as we undertake the challenge of addressing your unique problem. You’ll see the depth and breadth of talent, experience, and passion that is present in our custom solutions team, and you’ll be pleased with the solution that we develop for you.

We use high-quality North American steel, CNC machined components, and fully welded steel frames for added strength and longevity for your toughest moves. Our decades of experience in manufacturing the best machinery skates and structural moving skates in the world will put the creation of your custom skates in the best hands. Rest assured knowing that you have a team of the best in the business working on your custom solution.

With skate capacities ranging from 1.5 tons to 150 tons each, Hevi-Haul has built custom skates for a myriad of applications for companies in many different industries. Whether the problem is moving specialized heavy equipment, a large and unruly load of material, or a delicate operation moving a historical landmark, Hevi-Haul can design and build a load-moving product that meets your needs and gets the job done.

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Machinery Skates 101

Our world is being built every day by machinery with astonishing technology and advanced engineering. Ambitious construction projects with massive material loads are breaking ground at an increasing rate, erecting innovative structures to serve the next generation of American workers. History is being preserved, with existing structures being carefully relocated so they can continue to be enjoyed and appreciated for many decades to come. These undertakings, and much more, require unbelievably heavy loads to be moved from place to place, carefully and confidently. At Hevi-Haul, we build the finest machinery skates available, creating value with products that move the world.

Since 1938, Hevi-Haul has been manufacturing the highest quality machinery skates for professional machinery movers, rigging companies, and customers with load moving needs. We’ve developed a line of machinery skates that allow versatility and specialized functionality, meeting and exceeding the needs of our customers with unmatched quality and technological innovation. Here’s a look at the different types of machinery skates that make up the Hevi-Haul line:

Hevi-Haul Utility Skates

Utility skates offer unmatched versatility, ideal for both turning and straight line moving applications. Available in both Tilting and Non-Tilting variations, utility skate capacities range from 1.5 tons to 37.5 tons per skate, rolling on interchangeable steel or polyurethane coated rollers.

Hevi-Haul Straight Line Skates

Straight Line Skates are as their name suggests: the ultimate machinery moving dollies for straight line moving. Straight Line Skates are ideal for narrow, limited space moving and heavy duty straight line moving applications. Capacities range from 2.5 tons to 100 tons per skate, rolling on interchangeable steel or polyurethane coated rollers. A wide stance provides increased stability and weight distribution under load.

Hevi-Haul Compact Swivel Skates

Compact Swivel Skates pack a lot of moving capacity in a small, low profile package. Perfect for light to medium duty loads requiring full directional control. Capacities range from 1.5 tons to 12.5 tons per skate, rolling on interchangeable steel or polyurethane coated rollers. Each swivel top skate has a friction plate between the top frame of the dolly and bottom surface of the swivel plate to reduce swimming under load and eliminating the need for a locking mechanism.

Hevi-Haul designs and builds an entire line of highly capable machinery skates for any application. Fully welded steel frames bring the ruggedness and unmatched quality you know and expect from Hevi-Haul. Their low profile design allows for minimum load jacking and maximum load clearance. These factors, and many more, add up the best load-moving products in the world.

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Bosch Tavern Tug

How do you move a 150-ton building 25 feet to the west? With the manpower of hundreds of enthusiastic neighbors and the smooth, efficient operation of Hevi-Haul skates – the best structural moving skates on the market – that’s how!

Last year, an expansion of the Highway 100 thoroughfare threatened the existence of the beloved Bosch Tavern in Hales Corners, WI. The road was slated to be widened, and the Tavern’s front steps led right out onto the adjacent sidewalk – the building would have to go.

Originally a hotel built in 1905, the historical building holds a special place in the hearts of the locals that frequent the Bosch Tavern. When the owner decided that the only way to save his business was to move the building, the response from the community was loud and clear! With local radio stations spreading the word, the term “Tavern Tug” was coined, and the event was scheduled for October 8th, 2016.

Before moving day, the building was separated from its foundation, and a structure was put in place to support the massive I-beams that would, in turn, support the building during the move. The building was raised and placed on its temporary support structure. Consisting of a grid of I-beams separated by Hevi-Haul Straight Line Structural Moving Skates, this structure was designed to efficiently, safely, and effectively move the building to its final resting place.

With the expert contractor Badger Contracting, Inc. running the show, the building and its moving structure were prepped and fitted with several long ropes to enable the Tavern Tug attendees to get in the game and assist with the move. When the day of the event finally arrived, the crowd size exceeded expectations – over 200 people showed up to help with the move!

As the crowd provided the raw power, Hevi-Haul skates enabled the structure to roll, slowly but steadily. With up to a 100 ton capacity per skate, our Straight Line skates provided more than enough capability to move this massive building in a smooth, linear motion.

It all went off without a hitch, and the event’s organizers even managed to raise money for a local charity – all in the name of community. Today, the Bosch Tavern is reopened in its new location: 25 feet west of the old location.

No matter if it’s a century-old building, or a brand new machine, if it’s heavy and it needs to move smoothly, Hevi-Haul skates are the answer.

All About Utility Skates: Part 2: Non-Tilting Utility Skates