How to design functional and efficient loading docks using a turntable

One of the challenges architects face when designing a loading dock is to be able to balance aesthetics with its functionality, providing a space that is practical, positively improves productivity and considers the safety of everyone in the warehouse. This is where the loading docks turntables enter.

Including a turntable in your design can be a game-changing decision. This rotatory platform will not only help you with space optimisation, but it can also benefit your clients by saving time during the loading and unloading of materials or goods. (Read more about it)

Installing a turntable means positive results for every business, including yours, of course, and this is why:

Functionality

When designing loading docks it is important to consider the key role these play in the logistics system of a company, since they act as a bridge between the transport truck and the storage building. Therefore, they need to be planned and designed based on the highest structural and safety standards.

Turntables allow businesses to take advantage of an increased amount of usable space, be it for parking, storage or additional retail. 

For example, with a turntable, clearance zones can decrease to a minimum, which often means the loading dock area can be reduced by half while productivity increases.

Accessibility and Productivity

An optimal loading dock design considers its location, access point difficulty and, of course, the number of vehicles that it will have to accomodate at the same time.

Since the role of the truck turntable is to eliminate reversing manoeuvres for trucks on site, incorporating a turntable in your design will:

• Facilitate access for trucks and drivers
• Allow the loading dock to accept larger trucks
• Reduce time delays
• Minimise the loading dock footprint (larger trucks = less deliveries required)

Additionally, Australian Turntables loading dock turntables can safely accommodate and rotate more than one vehicle at a time. With this solution, you can deliver a design that is efficient and still meets the look you envision. 

Safety

The loading dock area is one of the busiest sections of a warehouse, where accidents and high-risk situations are often caused by trucks during reversing manoeuvres due to poor visibility, coordination or control. 

With a turntable, you can eliminate potential on-site hazards by providing truck drivers with a clear frontal view. 

At Australian Turntables, we work with architects and builders in the early design stages to provide all the site-specific safety assessments and offer several optional extras to help increase safety, including exclusion zones, automatic cut-offs, sensors, mirrors and traffic lights. 

We can install anti-collision systems to ensure vehicles in the loading dock are positioned correctly and stop the turntable if a worker enters the area. This keeps everyone safe and prevents property damage. 

Drive Revenue and Profit – real ROI

For businesses, the faster a shipment is processed the better. Since trucks are loaded last-in, first-out, a plan to quickly and efficiently load different products is vital. Every moment spent waiting on truck loading is lost time and productivity not only for the distribution centre, but also the truck lines and drivers. 

To make sure your design provides the productivity that will make your clients’ lives easier, it is important to calculate the appropriate space, number of truck bays and dock access to the facility. After this, a turntable will do the rest of the job.

Loading docks turntables also provides more usable space for items such as truck liftgates, forklift operations and conveyors – if these are used in loading and unloading pallets in the dock area. 

We have done this for many clients, such as Coles Group, helping to reduce the probability of incidents while creating a more efficient workflow system.

Specifying a turntable

When using one of our loading docks turntables in your design, you and your clients will benefit from the fact that we provide redundancy as standard with all risk scenarios addressed, safely accommodating and rotating more than one vehicle at a time.

We offer an innovative approach to engineering, so that we can design a turntable that meets your specific requirements. Visit our DOWNLOADS TECHNICAL SUPPORT AREA to get started.

Let’s work together to start turning things for the better.