DRIVING IMPRESSION: Merlo has returned to the 3.0t handler market with the relatively svelte TF30.7, small in stature with a sizeable punch. There have been lots of changes to the long-awaited TF32.6 successor.
When we were told by Merlo UK that we would have one of its new compact telehandlers to test this autumn we started making some plans for some lighter weight loader work – the sort of stuff that wouldn’t be over-taxing for a little load-lugger. And then we re-read our emails – we’d been offered a Turbofarmer 30.7. In old school Merlo model numbering that’d be a 3.0-tonne machine with the ability to reach 7.0m high – not the performance characteristics you’d normally expect of a ‘compact’ handler.
So, we thought we’d better double-check. The response was somewhat curt. Yes, the 30.7 will squeeze through a 2.0m wide gateway and yes, it’ll limbo under cladding rails just 2.2m high and yes, it’ll lift a maximum of 3,000kg. However, with some unashamed ‘rounding-up’ the Italian marketing department slapped a ‘.7’ sticker on the side of the new machine, despite the fact its tines will only stretch 6.7m skywards. But let’s not get bogged down in the details…
The end result was that we needed to revise our plans – to properly test what we’ll call Merlo’s new middle-weight machine we’d needed to ask it to do some proper farm work, not just waltz round the yard with a couple of bags of shavings balanced on the pallet forks.
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