Telehandler Buyer's Guide | Equipment Solutions

Buyer's Guide · 2026-06-05

A telehandler is the machine you reach for when you need to lift a load, move it, and place it up high or way out in front of you. It's part forklift, part crane, part loader. With the right attachments it'll load a truck with forks, carry bulk material in a bucket, or hang a jib for crane work. If you're trying to figure out which one fits your jobs, here's how we'd break it down.

We carry Gehl telehandlers from compact rental-friendly machines up to full-size 55-footers, so we'll point to those as we go.

Two numbers to nail down first: height and capacity

Every telehandler gets named around two specs, and you'll see them right in the model number. A "TH9-50" lifts 9,000 lbs to about 50 feet. Get these two right and you're most of the way there.

Maximum lift height is how high you can place a load. Match it to your tallest task with a little margin. Setting trusses on a two-story house is a different reach than feeding block to masons on a three-story job.

Maximum capacity is the most the machine will lift, but read the fine print. Capacity drops as you reach higher and farther out. A machine rated at 9,000 lbs might only handle 6,000 lbs near the top of its reach. We'll walk you through the load chart so there are no surprises on site.

Here's the rough ladder of what we carry:

• Compact, under 20 ft - the RS5-19 G3 lifts 5,500 lbs to about 19 ft. Tight sites and rental fleets love it.
• Compact, 30-ish ft - the RS6-34 G3 reaches around 34 ft at 6,000 lbs and still stays under 75 hp.
• Mid-size, 42 ft - the TH6-42 at 6,000 lbs and the TH8-42 at 8,000 lbs cover most framing and masonry work.
• Full-size, 50 ft and up - the TH9-50 at 9,000 lbs and the TH12-55 at 12,000 lbs and 55 ft of reach handle the big multi-story jobs.

Don't skip horizontal reach

Lift height gets all the attention, but horizontal outreach is just as important. That's how far the boom extends out in front of the machine, which is what lets you place a load over a foundation, past a wall, or across a trench without driving right up to the edge.

A compact 19-footer reaches out about 11 feet. The big TH12-55 stretches past 42 feet of outreach. The more you need to place loads away from where the machine can park, the more outreach matters.

Frame size, weight, and the DEF question

A telehandler's footprint and weight decide where it fits and how you haul it.

• Compact machines like the RS5-19 G3 and RS6-34 G3 are narrower, lighter, and easier to trailer. They're the rental-fleet favorites and a smart pick for tighter sites.
• Full-size machines like the TH9-50 and TH12-55 are wider and heavier, but you're buying that reach and capacity for a reason. Make sure your trailer and truck are rated to haul the operating weight before you commit.

One detail worth knowing: our compact telehandlers that stay under 75 horsepower skip the DEF (diesel exhaust fluid) system that bigger diesels require. That's one less fluid to manage and one less thing to think about, which is part of why the RS-series is so popular with crews who want a low-hassle machine.

Attachments make the machine

A telehandler with just forks is handy. A telehandler with the right attachment for the job is a different machine entirely. Ask us about:

• Pallet forks for truck loading and material handling
• Buckets for bulk material
• Jib cranes and winches for lifting and placing awkward loads
• Carriages with side-shift and fork positioning for precise placement

Most of these run off the same machine, so one telehandler can wear a lot of hats over a workday.

Let's match it to your jobs

The right telehandler is the one sized to your tallest, heaviest, farthest task, not the biggest one we can sell you. Tell us what you're building and where, and we'll get you into the right reach and capacity.

Browse the full telehandler lineup to compare lift heights and capacities, or request a quote on any model and we'll go over the load chart with you.

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