Electric Forklifts
Best for: Indoor work on finished floors, and anywhere noise or fumes are a problem. Lithium-ion models charge during breaks, which suits sites running more than one shift.
View the rangePart of our UK forklift hire service, delivered from eight depots on our own lorries. In Norwich we also offer cherry picker hire, scissor lift hire and access platform hire.
Your local depot
Hire from our Rackheath depot
Our East Anglia service centre is at 31 Mission Road on Rackheath Industrial Estate, five minutes off the A1151 and a short run from the northern bypass. It is a full regional centre rather than a sales office: engineers, a parts store, a workshop and hire machines on the yard. Machines for Norwich are prepared here, go out on our own transport and come back to the same yard, and the collection is booked at the same time as the delivery.
Calling 01603 721 208 puts you straight through to the Rackheath team, not a national call centre, Monday to Friday from 8am to 5pm. Outside those hours the emergency breakdown callout line runs 24 hours a day. The engineer who comes out works from this building, knows the roads and carries the common parts on the van, and across the company 92 out of every 100 callouts we attend are fixed on the first visit.
It also means the answer to a question is available now. Whether a job needs a three tonne diesel or a reach truck, whether a floor will take a solid tyre, or whether a thorough examination is due in six months or twelve, you can ask the people who will be doing the work, on the same call, rather than waiting for somebody to ring back from another part of the country.
Machines for the job
Which forklift for Norwich work
Most Norwich sites need one of six kinds of truck, and the choice comes down to the load, the height, the aisle and the floor. Electric counterbalance trucks suit chilled, food-grade and finished indoor floors, where fumes and noise matter. Diesel counterbalance trucks on pneumatic tyres do the heavy outdoor work in merchants' yards and on the open estates. LPG trucks cover the sites that go in and out of a building in the same shift.
The distribution units on the A47 and A11 work to height in narrow aisles, which is what reach trucks are for, and where an aisle is too tight to turn a conventional truck a Flexi articulated truck does the same job in roughly half the width. For goods-in, stores and loading from the back of a lorry, powered pallet trucks and stackers are often all a site needs. If you are not sure, give us the four numbers and we will specify it.
Attachments, access platforms and industrial cleaning machinery can go out on the same hire as the truck. Across the range we hire STILL, Hyundai and Lonking counterbalance and warehouse trucks alongside Flexi articulated trucks, so the machine is chosen for the job in front of it rather than for the brand on the side.
Diesel Forklifts
Best for: Heavy outdoor work, yards and rough ground, usually on pneumatic tyres.
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LP Gas Forklifts
Best for: Sites that work inside and outside in the same shift. A balance of power and flexibility, and can run indoors where there is adequate ventilation.
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Reach Trucks for Sale and Hire
Best for: Racked warehouses that stack to height. Tell us your racking height, aisle width and heaviest pallet.
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Articulated Forklifts
Best for: Aisles too narrow to turn a counterbalance truck, and awkward or non-standard loads.
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Powered Pallet Trucks
Best for: Goods-in, loading from the back of a lorry and moving pallets at floor level.
View the rangeWhere we work
Norwich estates and the work they do
Around the ring road the work changes from one estate to the next. Broadland Business Park at Thorpe St Andrew and the estates at Rackheath mix offices, light industry and storage, which suits a small electric fleet with a pallet truck alongside. Hurricane Way and the airport estates, Sweet Briar and Whiffler Road run trade counters, builders' merchants and distribution, with diesel and LPG counterbalance working the yards. Hall Road and Harford on the A47 southern bypass carry the bigger distribution and trade sites.
Longwater Business Park at Costessey mixes retail and trade stock handling, and Norwich Research Park at Colney is science and laboratory space, where clean, quiet electric equipment is the right answer. Further out, the same depot works the port at Great Yarmouth, Lowestoft, and the A11 corridor to Wymondham, where heavier diesel trucks and long forks come into their own for dockside and outdoor loads.
West along the A47 the same centre covers Dereham and King's Lynn, and south it reaches into Suffolk towards Ipswich. A business with sites across the county, or on both sides of the Norfolk and Suffolk border, deals with one depot, one phone number and one set of engineers who already know each site.
- Rackheath Industrial Estate
- Broadland Business Park, Thorpe St Andrew
- Hurricane Way and Vulcan Road, by the airport
- Sweet Briar and Whiffler Road
- Hall Road and Harford, on the A47
- Longwater Business Park, Costessey
- Norwich Research Park, Colney
With every machine
What comes with a Norwich hire
A hire from Rackheath comes looked after. The engineers who service and repair forklifts in Norwich maintain the hire machines as well, so a truck on a long hire is kept on its servicing schedule without you arranging it. We book the LOLER thorough examination too: at least every twelve months for a truck lifting loads, and every six where it lifts people. The hire fleet is CFTS accredited.
If a machine goes down, the hire fleet and the engineers share a yard here, so a replacement can be prepared and a visit booked in the same conversation. Operator training covers novice, refresher and conversion courses, on your site or at the centre, and the parts store supplies traction batteries and chargers, tyres and forklift attachments, supplied and fitted.
If you also run trucks of your own, the same engineers can look after them: see forklift servicing in Norwich.
- 44Years supplying and servicing handling equipment
- 8Regional service centres across the UK
- 92%Of callouts fixed on the first visit
- 3,500Machines under our care nationwide
Hire terms
Hire terms and prices
Hire runs from a single day through to long-term contract hire, from £85 a week. The rate moves with the machine, its lifting capacity and lift height, any attachments, and how long you keep it: longer hires cost less per week. Short-term hire covers a peak, a project or a truck off the road, and emergency hire is there for the day something has gone wrong.
Regular customers can put the machine, its servicing and its statutory inspections together as a contract, in one monthly payment with cover if the truck is off the road. Fleet management extends that across several sites. If hire stops making sense, we sell new and used machines and take part exchange on your old truck, working or not. All prices are ex VAT.
| Option | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Short-term hire | From a single day, from £85 a week |
| Emergency hire | Cover when a truck of your own stops |
| Contract hire | The truck, its servicing and its statutory inspections can be brought together in one monthly payment |
| Fleet management | The same across several sites |
| Buy new or used | Part exchange on your old truck, working or not |
All prices are ex VAT.
Local service supporting local customers
Acclaim Handling, East Anglia Service Centre
Your service centre
Your Norwich service centre
Rackheath is one of Acclaim's eight regional service centres, and it is the one that answers when a business in Norfolk or north Suffolk calls. Acclaim has been supplying and looking after handling equipment since 1982 and is still independent, which means the machine we recommend is the one that suits the job. We are an exclusive dealer for STILL, Hyundai and Lonking, and we also supply Flexi articulated trucks, Genie access equipment and Kärcher cleaning machinery. The same team handles sales, hire and service, so one call can cover a new or used truck, a hire and a service contract.
"Local service supporting local customers" is the phrase this centre has used since Acclaim invested in the Rackheath site: short journeys, the same faces, and a service manager on the same industrial estate as many of its customers. Its customers rate it 5.0 out of 5 on Google.
31 Mission Road, Rackheath Industrial Estate, Norwich, Norfolk NR13 6PL
Ask for a hire quote
Machines available to hire
Machines in stock now with a weekly hire rate. Open one for its photos and full specification.
Used2024 LONKING CPYD30-XL
TypeGasCapacity3,000 kgLift height4,700 mm
Hire from £105 / week View machine
Used2024 HYUNDAI 35LN-9A
TypeGasCapacity3,500 kgLift height6,000 mm
Hire from £105 / week View machine
Used2023 LONKING LG25GLT
TypeGasCapacity2,500 kgLift height4,700 mm
Hire from £95 / week View machine
Used2023 LONKING LG18B
TypeElectricCapacity1,800 kgLift height4,750 mm
Hire from £95 / week View machine
Used2023 LONKING LG18BE
TypeElectric 3-Wheel 48 voltCapacity1,800 kgLift height4,700 mm
Hire from £95 / week View machine
Used2022 LONKING LG18B
TypeElectricCapacity1,800 kgLift height4,700 mm
Hire from £95 / week View machine
Used2022 HYUNDAI 15L-7M
TypeGasCapacity1,500 kgLift height4,000 mm
Hire from £95 / week View machine
Used2022 HYUNDAI 18L-7M
TypeGasCapacity1,800 kgLift height4,500 mm
Hire from £95 / week View machine
Used2022 HYUNDAI 18L-7M
TypeGasCapacity1,800 kgLift height4,500 mm
Hire from £95 / week View machine
Used2022 STILL RX20 1.6P
TypeElectricCapacity1,600 kgLift height3,480 mm
Hire from £95 / week View machine
Used2021 HYUNDAI 35DN-9V
TypeDieselCapacity3,500 kgLift height4,500 mm
Hire from £105 / week View machine
Used2021 HYUNDAI 35DN-9V
TypeDieselCapacity3,500 kgLift height4,500 mm
Hire from £105 / week View machine
FAQ's
Start with four numbers: heaviest load, highest lift, narrowest aisle and whether the work is indoors, outdoors or both. Around Norwich the answer splits fairly cleanly. Chilled and food-grade space on a finished floor takes electric counterbalance trucks and powered pallet trucks. The A47 and A11 distribution units run reach trucks, and where an aisle is too tight to turn a conventional truck a Flexi articulated does the same job in roughly half the width. Merchants' yards and the outdoor estates take diesel or LPG on pneumatic tyres. Call Rackheath on 01603 721 208 with those four numbers.
Yes. The Rackheath depot works the whole of Norfolk and north Suffolk, so Great Yarmouth, Lowestoft, Dereham, Wymondham and the villages between them sit on the same delivery runs as the city. Machines go out and come back on our own transport, and the collection is booked at the same time as the hire.
From a single day. Hire starts from £85 a week, and the rate moves with the machine, its capacity and how long you keep it. Longer hires cost less per week, and a fixed-term contract can bring the truck, its servicing and its statutory inspections together in one monthly payment.
We do, along with the servicing, and it is the East Anglia engineers who already cover Norwich who carry it out. A fork truck lifting loads needs a thorough examination at least every twelve months; where it is being used to lift people that drops to every six. The hire fleet is CFTS accredited, and 92 out of every 100 callouts we attend are fixed on the first visit.
Yes. Acclaim runs operator, refresher and instructor courses, and training can be booked to land alongside the hire so the machine arrives with certificated drivers ready for it. Mention it when you call and it goes on the same quote.
Talk to the East Anglia service centre about forklift hire in Norwich
Call Rackheath direct on 01603 721 208, call head office on 01708 861 414, or email hello@acclaimhandling.com. The form above reaches the same team.
8 Regional Depots
- Head Office South East
Rainham, Essex
View Depot Details & Get Directions - East Anglia Service Centre
Rackheath, Norfolk
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Rugby, Warwickshire
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Prescot, Merseyside
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Cosham, Portsmouth
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Spalding, Lincolnshire
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Spencers Wood, Reading
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Chatham, Kent
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