Electric Stacker

What the CPDS walkie stacker actually does

One machine, two motions. The drive wheel moves the load at walking pace while the operator steers from the tiller; the lift circuit raises up to 2 t onto rack beams as high as 5,500 mm, mast depending. Because the operator walks, there is no seat, cab or suspension to pay for — the cost sits in the motor, mast and battery, where it belongs.

The control head carries the throttle, horn, lift and lower rockers and the reversing pad that stops and backs the machine if the operator is pinned. An emergency stop sits on the chassis. These are the photos in the gallery — production machines on our own floor, with the chain anchors and free-lift cylinder visible.

Electric pallet jack or electric stacker?

An electric pallet jack powers travel but lifts only a few centimeters: it moves pallets, it never stacks them. The walkie stacker does the same horizontal work and adds the mast. If your racking is single-deep and under 5.5 m, one CPDS usually replaces a powered pallet jack plus whatever was doing the lifting.

The reverse is also true and worth saying plainly: if you only ever travel — dock to staging, no racking — a low-lift machine is cheaper and lighter, and a stacker's mast is dead weight. Tell us the workflow and we will spec the cheaper machine when that is the right answer.

Battery choice, charging and upkeep

Lead-acid is the budget pick and tolerates a simple daily-charge routine; lithium costs more upfront but takes opportunity charging at breaks and skips watering entirely. Both come in 48 V packs on this chassis. For single-shift work, lead-acid usually wins on total cost; for double shifts, lithium earns its premium back in uptime.

Routine care is short: tire and fork checks, chain lubrication, and battery discipline. When throughput grows past walking pace, the same control logic carries over to our ride-on stacker with stand-on pedals; when most loads go above 4 m into narrow aisles, look at the CPDR reach truck instead.

Walk-Behind, Semi-Electric or Full-Electric: Which Configuration

Walkie stacker and pedestrian stacker are the same design — the European trade uses "pedestrian stacker" because the operator walks alongside the tiller rather than riding, and both terms describe the CPDS platform on this page.

The control head is built around that walking position. The reversing pad on the tiller face cuts power and reverses the drive the instant it contacts the operator's body, so a pinned operator is pushed clear rather than crushed against a rack upright. A separate emergency-stop button on the chassis kills all circuits regardless of tiller position, for use once the operator has already stepped back. The throttle is a proportional twist or thumb control rather than a stepped switch, so speed builds smoothly from a crawl — useful for threading a loaded pallet into a tight rack bay instead of snapping straight to governed speed.

Choosing between walk-behind, semi-electric and full-electric comes down to lift frequency. If the truck only lifts a handful of times a shift, our semi-electric stacker — listed separately on this site — saves cost by using a manual hydraulic pump for lift while still motorizing travel. Once lifting happens continuously through a shift, the pump becomes the bottleneck and the CPDS full-electric earns back its price difference in operator time. Walk-behind itself remains the right call as long as travel distances stay short enough that walking pace doesn't cost real throughput; once runs get long, that's a signal to look at the ride-on stacker, not to abandon the walk-behind category.

Capacity and specs: 1 ton, 1.5 ton, 2 ton options

The CPDS line runs three standard capacities: 1,000 kg (about 2,200 lb), 1,500 kg (about 3,300 lb), and 2,000 kg (about 4,400 lb), all at the standard 500 mm load center. That's a different class of machine from the 10,000–15,000 lb electric pallet jacks used for ride-on freight handling — those are heavier equipment built for a different job. Most small-warehouse and 3PL work sits comfortably in the 1–2 ton range.

Lift height is the second variable. Masts ship at 1,600, 2,000, 2,500, 3,000, 3,500, 4,000, or 5,500 mm, in single, two, or three-stage free-lift or full-free configurations depending on the build. The 1,600 mm entry mast suits low racking and floor-level staging; the 5,500 mm triple-stage mast serves high-bay warehouses reaching a fourth or fifth beam. Service weight starts from 510 kg, which keeps the machine manageable on loading docks and inside standard containers. Standard forks are 1,150 × 180 × 50 mm; longer or narrower forks are available as a factory build option.

Stacker types: straddle, counterbalance, platform and reach

The CPDS is a straddle stacker by geometry: two outrigger legs extend along the floor and straddle the pallet from the sides, so the machine carries no heavy rear counterweight. That keeps the machine lighter and gives it a tighter turning radius than a counterbalanced design — the tradeoff is that the legs need clear floor space under the pallet, which rules out closed-base pallets and pallets sitting flush against a dock plate.

A counterbalance walkie stacker solves that specific problem: it drops the outrigger legs and carries rear ballast instead, so it can pick up closed-base pallets or work right up against a flush dock where legs can't enter. It's a heavier machine for the same capacity, trading the straddle design's light weight and tight turning radius for that clearance.

Platform and reach stackers are different product categories built off similar chassis logic. A platform stacker replaces the forks with a flat work platform — used for order picking or light assembly at height rather than pallet handling. A reach stacker adds a telescoping carriage that extends the forks forward into the rack before lifting, letting the truck work deep racking without driving fully into the aisle; our CPDR reach truck is the dedicated product for that job. The CPDS itself does not reach — it lifts straight up in the spot where it's parked.

Applications: warehouse, narrow aisle, cold storage and rough terrain

The core use is racked-warehouse work — dock to rack, put-away and picking. For narrow-aisle operations, the CPDS's 1,500 mm turning radius suits standard single-deep racking in aisles down to roughly 2.5 m without needing dedicated very-narrow-aisle equipment.

Cold storage is a common deployment. The 48 V lithium pack holds its capacity better than lead-acid in sub-zero temperatures, and the fully sealed drive housing handles the condensation that forms when the machine moves between a cold room and an ambient dock. Ask for the cold-room battery spec when ordering for this environment. Distribution centers and 3PL operations run the same machine for inbound put-away and outbound pick-and-stage — one truck covers both without a change-over.

Rough terrain is an honest conversation. The standard CPDS rides on solid tires and is built for smooth concrete or hard-packed floors — nothing else. Outdoor staging areas, gravel, or uneven yards need pneumatic tires, a higher-clearance chassis, and reinforced forks, which is a different build quoted to order, not the same machine on bigger wheels. Tell us the surface and load and we'll specify the right build rather than overpromise the standard one.

Factory-Direct Pricing

Factory-direct pricing removes two layers that sit on top of a distributor's sticker price: the import markup on machines shipped in from overseas, and the dealer margin added when a domestic distributor resells them. The steel, motor and electronics are the same regardless of which layers get added on top — what changes is how many hands the machine passes through before it reaches your dock.

Container-load orders push the unit cost down further, since freight and paperwork spread across more units. Mixed containers combining stackers with reach trucks and hand pallet trucks are common and straightforward for us to arrange.

For buyers benchmarking price, Yale, Big Joe and Clark are the usual reference points — well-known brands with well-known distributor pricing. We aren't a reseller of any of them; we're the factory. Send your spec and delivery port and we'll return an FOB Shandong quote you can compare directly against those numbers.

Where to buy and what electric stacker prices look like

We're a Shandong factory with direct export experience, and the price we quote — for any capacity, mast height, or battery chemistry — is the manufacturing cost plus margin, with no distributor layer added on top.

Retail channels that list stackers under well-known brand names are often sourcing from factories like ours; the gap between their listed price and a direct FOB quote is mostly the supply chain in between. Ordering by the container improves the unit economics further. We ship stacked and shrink-wrapped on wood bases, and mixed containers combining stackers, reach trucks and hand pallet trucks are something we handle routinely.

To get a number, send us your capacity, lift height, and delivery port. We return a datasheet and FOB price within one business day, whether you're ordering a single unit or a full container.

Battery, motor, wheels and key components

The 48 V battery is the largest variable in the spec. A lithium battery lasts 1,500–2,000 charge cycles to 80% capacity and accepts partial charging without memory effect; a lead-acid pack costs less upfront and is serviceable with basic tools. Both fit the same battery compartment on the CPDS chassis. Replacement batteries use the same 48 V form factor as the original — confirmed on the datasheet we send with the machine.

The drive motor is a brushless DC unit coupled to the drive wheel through a reduction gearbox. It provides regenerative braking on descent — energy feeds back to the battery rather than burning off as heat. The travel controller limits loaded speed to 5 km/h; the same throttle signal controls direction, making the machine simple to learn for new operators. Wheels are solid polyurethane or solid rubber on the drive and load positions — no puncture risk on warehouse floors with nail debris. Standard forks are 1,150 × 180 × 50 mm; the chain, anchors and free-lift cylinder are visible in the gallery photos.

How to operate, types overview, and use cases

Operating the CPDS follows a short learning curve: power on, select direction at the tiller throttle, steer by the handle, and use the lift/lower rockers to raise and position the load. The operator walks beside the tiller at the machine's governed 5–6 km/h — never riding, since this is a walk-behind design. Stand-on and ride-on variants exist as separate products for operations where walking pace becomes the bottleneck.

The broader category breaks into four types: walk-behind (the CPDS), rider/center-rider (stand-on or seated), reach truck (extending carriage for deep racking), and very-narrow-aisle (guided induction). The walk-behind covers roughly 90% of small to mid-warehouse operations under 5,500 mm lift and 2,000 kg capacity. Automated and AMR platforms are a separate, guided or autonomous product category — not this machine — and we'll direct you honestly to the right supplier rather than misrepresent the CPDS as something it isn't.