On Tue, 09 May 2006 22:10:57 -0700, Grant Erwin
wrote:

Basically a forklift, but buying and keeping a forklift just
to move three pieces of equipment back and forth 100 ft would be
ridiculous. And cost 5X the cost of the equipment itself :-) Are
there forklift-like devices, just the front end of the forklift but
wheeled manually, which are still quite small/portable and affordable?
If so, what am I looking for; what would it be called?

A pallet jack. Have a look at a pallet jack and design your machines so they can
use one.

Powered pallet jack - has 24V or 36V of deep-cycle batteries on it,
has a drive motor to take out the heavy pushing involved, and usually
a hydraulic pump power lift for the forks.

WARNING: It does NOT violate the laws of center of gravity, nor of
'The bigger they are the harder they fall'. They are designed for
moving a pallet full of boxes with a fairly low CG. If you put tall
heavy and tippy loads on top of a power jack, you have to be very
gentle in your motions or someone's gonna get crunched.

If you are on campus you ought to be able to talk someone into the use of a
forklift anyway.

And for really big stuff that would tip too easily, you might be
better off to build a permanent cart for it with swivel or fixed
casters mounted way out at the corners to maximize stability, and
drop-foot stabilizers to park it in place. The forklift or power jack
would be good for the tugging and pushing work, so make provisions for
fork pockets under it.

-- Bruce --