Majorlift Brand Update
Majorlift: the undisputed market leaders in hydraulic lifting equipment!
We are incredibly proud that every single piece of our powerful equipment is designed and engineered by us, right here in the UK.
For over half a century, Majorlift has been the bedrock of power, reliability, and safety in hydraulic lifting. Since 1971, every single tool has been meticulously crafted with our deep expertise, right here in our cutting-edge UK factory. We don’t just build equipment: we service and support the very foundation of your operational success, guaranteeing years of flawless performance, unrivalled safety and product quality.
As industries change and move forward, so do we. Majorlift is incredibly excited to reveal our dynamic new logo. This isn’t just a fresh look, it’s a powerful symbol that both respects our rich history and propels us boldly into tomorrow, showcasing our enduring dedication to innovation and excellence.
Introducing Majorlift’s NEW Agricultural jack
Majorlift have a long and proud history of manufacturing hydraulic jacks in the UK that dates back to the early 1970s. With a reputation built on excellent products, first-class customer service & market leading 5-year warranty, they have now developed a new product, the AFJ20 aimed at the Agricultural sector. Featuring twin rams and an air hydraulic power pack giving 20 Tonne lift capacity that will allow safe and secure maintenance of heavy equipment this new tool only requires a flat floor and a compressed air supply to get going. Highly manoeuvrable, with four sprung castors on the corners, it can be easily positioned under any vehicle and then activated to lift the axle so that the wheels clear the ground, either for tyre changes or maintenance tasks. The rams give a maximum lift of 12 inches, but extensions can be used to adjust the height of the lift.
With tractors and their wheels getting heavier, this new solution gives a rock-solid working platform by lifting on two points along the axle. Once lifted, the locking collar can be spun down to give a positive mechanical lock that keeps the vehicle up in the air – even if all the oil is drained out by accident, removing the need for use of axle stands. Originally designed for use with military vehicles, the Majorlift AFJ20 is tough, dependable and resilient. Thorough design and testing has been followed by extensive trials with contractors to test and then subtly change the product for optimum user convenience and flexibility. The main change has been to design new adaptors, with the introduction of these it has become even more versatile, as now it has become suitable for changing tyres on crop sprayers.
Majorlift are a privately-owned manufacturer of hydraulic lifting equipment, based near Bristol. All design and manufacture take place in their own factory, including the machining and assembly of hydraulic rams, cylinders and the air motors. Majorlift’s MD, Tristram Southgate who studied Agricultural Engineering in Silsoe, commented “Everything we do is about improving. We train our staff, we improve the factory and we have a programme of rolling improvement of the machinery. This means we replace one machine tool every year – as an example, we have just replaced our second, ABB robotic welder and earlier this year we installed a new spray shop. We need to keep up with the technology so that we can offer the best products to our customers.”
Majorlift may be a new name within Agriculture, but have been supplying Automotive lifting solutions for over forty years. Much of that equipment is still working and Majorlift has a dedicated Service and Exchange facility to keep it going. Rams & Power packs can be easily swapped out and replaced or the whole unit can be returned to Majorlift for overhaul out of season.
Chris Hodder, Majorlift’s Sales Manager, added “come and see us at LAMMA in January at the NEC. We are on Stand 20.116, opposite JCB’s stand. We will be exhibiting the AFJ20 and widely used FTJ1000 floor transmission jack, along with other relevant products such as a 50 Tonne workshop press, new air operated 10 tonne trolley jack, 8 tonne high lift trolley jack, agricultural wheel dolly, along with others, all manufactured by Compac in Denmark, for whom we are agents. We are very proud of the work we have done to get the AFJ20 ready for the show and will be very happy to demonstrate it to you”
Pugh, Pugh, Barney McGrew….
Britain’s latest Firefighter…
Ashley Pugh has passed out as a retained fire fighter with Gloucester Fire & Rescue after five weeks of training. Ashley, who works in Majorlift’s machine shop as a CNC machine tool operator, was released by Majorlift for the training in three blocks over two months. Having successfully completed his training, Ashley is now on call for the Stroud Fire Station and has already been out on some “shouts”. All of this is done outside his working hours as he is a keen and committed member of Majorlift’s production team.
“Lots of my family are already in the fire service and I was trained in Cheltenham where my uncle works. We learned a lot of useful skills, including how to safely use the breathing apparatus and it has long been an ambition of mine to join”
Tristram Southgate, Majorlift’s MD added “We are really proud of Ashley’s achievement. It is good to see team members developing their skills, inside and outside work, and we are especially keen to be supporting the Fire Service by releasing Ashley. Of course, we can also make use of his new skills to improve fire safety at work, so everybody wins”
Ashley Pugh has passed out as a retained fire fighter with Gloucester Fire & Rescue after five weeks of training. Ashley, who works in Majorlift’s machine shop as a CNC machine tool operator, was released by Majorlift for the training in three blocks over two months. Having successfully completed his training, Ashley is now on call for the Stroud Fire Station and has already been out on some “shouts”. All of this is done outside his working hours as he is a keen and committed member of Majorlift’s production team.
“Lots of my family are already in the fire service and I was trained in Cheltenham where my uncle works. We learned a lot of useful skills, including how to safely use the breathing apparatus and it has long been an ambition of mine to join”
Tristram Southgate, Majorlift’s MD added “We are really proud of Ashley’s achievement. It is good to see team members developing their skills, inside and outside work, and we are especially keen to be supporting the Fire Service by releasing Ashley. Of course, we can also make use of his new skills to improve fire safety at work, so everybody wins”
New hydraulic service centre
Majorlift are pleased to announce the establishment of a service and repair workshop, capable of the repair and reconditioning of any Majorlift product.
Setup with a dedicated team of highly skilled hydraulic engineers in a separate workshop, the service centre is fully equipped with all of the tools and machinery required to undertake all jobs from a simple ram reseal or power pack repair up to a full reconditioning of any of our products, including commercial pit jacks.
All our repairs are undertaken using original equipment parts and are fully guaranteed. A full recondition is backed with a 12 month warranty and a new test certificate, valid for a year.
Returned product is stripped back to bare metal, inspected and resprayed before begin returned in near new condition.
We also offer a service/exchange service, where we hold recondition rams and power packs on the shelf, ready for same day shipping to ensure your kit is back working quickly. Your own, life expired part can be returned to us at your leisure.
Setup with a dedicated team of highly skilled hydraulic engineers in a separate workshop, the service centre is fully equipped with all of the tools and machinery required to undertake all jobs from a simple ram reseal or power pack repair up to a full reconditioning of any of our products, including commercial pit jacks.
All our repairs are undertaken using original equipment parts and are fully guaranteed. A full recondition is backed with a 12 month warranty and a new test certificate, valid for a year.
Returned product is stripped back to bare metal, inspected and resprayed before begin returned in near new condition.
We also offer a service/exchange service, where we hold recondition rams and power packs on the shelf, ready for same day shipping to ensure your kit is back working quickly. Your own, life expired part can be returned to us at your leisure.
Any colour you like, Sir!
Majorlift are pleased to announce the successful installation of brand new, state of the art spray bay. Designed as a replacement for the original, 30 year old booth, the new equipment includes two new, enclosed booths and a central paint kitchen in between. It also features gas heating to enable work in the coldest weather and to “future proof” us against changes in paint technology.
Tristram Southgate, Majorlift’s MD said “we have made this investment after a lot of research and consideration. We needed to keep up with health & safety legislation and to provide a great working environment for our employees. However, we also chose this with an eye to increasing capacity. We have two new booths to replace the one old one and they are both double the height of the original, which gives us much more headroom for the new products we are introducing”.
Spray time can be considerably reduced, as one batch it can be drying in one booth while the next is being sprayed in the other. Our picture shows Richard spraying Majorlift’s popular 7900 air power packs.
Tristram Southgate, Majorlift’s MD said “we have made this investment after a lot of research and consideration. We needed to keep up with health & safety legislation and to provide a great working environment for our employees. However, we also chose this with an eye to increasing capacity. We have two new booths to replace the one old one and they are both double the height of the original, which gives us much more headroom for the new products we are introducing”.
Spray time can be considerably reduced, as one batch it can be drying in one booth while the next is being sprayed in the other. Our picture shows Richard spraying Majorlift’s popular 7900 air power packs.
Majorlift invests for the future
Majorlift are proud to announce the purchase of a new Doosan VM400II vertical machining centre.
This new VMC is in addition to the three Milacron mills that Majorlift already operate on a two shift system so will increase the milling capacity by a further 30%.
The biggest issue turned out to be “how do we fit it into our machine shop?” The answer was to completely re-organise the factory and by improving the workflow around the machines, created the necessary space.
It was a real team effort, with the operators involved in the siting of each machine to make it as efficient as possible. The team built up stocks beforehand and made the move over a weekend, to ensure that no customers were affected.
Tristram Southgate, Majorlift’s MD, said “The new machine doesn’t just look good – it has a 30 tool carousel and through spindle coolant to ensure greater accuracy and improved finishes. It has also enabled us to work with Quickgrind – our tooling supplier – to develop smarter tools which will reduce cycle times and improve the quality of product coming off the machines. This will reduce the five year payback period that we used to base the purchase decision on”.
Majorlift pride themselves in the fact that they design and manufacture all components in house, which includes all cylinders, rams and air motors. They also have further plans to invest in a new two spindle lathe with live tooling to enable more “one hit machining” as to ensure that their production in the UK remains competitive and affordable.
Solar Energy Project
In February 2014 we had 300 Solar Panels fitted to our factory roof, costing £85K and financed by a carbon trust loan over seven years.
The original plan was that It would be a self-funding project after 7 years we will be generating £12K of our own electricity per year based on 2014 prices.
In the last six months, this plant has generated nearly 60,000 KWh and we have been able to sell over £6K of electricity back to the grid, so we are on target to achieve our payback – and that’s if electricity prices remain at 2014 levels. Majorlift is proud to be doing its bit for the environment, energy saving and reducing power costs.
We’d be happy to demonstrate the system and put you in contact with the installers if you are interested in setting up your own solar plant.
Malcolm Knight Retires
Malcolm retired last week after 17 years on Majorlift’s sales desk. He will be missed by customers and colleagues alike, as he was a font of knowledge and extremely diligent in order processing.
However, it was not a sad occasion, he’s in good health and has many plans that will keep him very busy over the coming months. We shut the factory on Friday lunchtime and the whole team adjourned to the local pub, where Malcolm was expecting to have a quiet lunch with Chris Hodder. You can imagine his surprise when he found 50 colleagues waiting for him to arrive.
One of Malcolm’s many passions is his Ukuleles – he has more than a dozen and is a very accomplished player. He has entertained us all in the office with his skill and is looking forward to being able to play in the Wednesday morning jam, now that he is not tied to the office during the day. Our picture shows Malcolm cutting the cake we bought him, made in the shape of and decorated as a ukulele. It was very tasty too.
Here’s to a long and happy retirement!
Majorlift Rail Range Press Release
Majorlift Hydraulic Engineering are a Bristol based manufacturer of specialist lifting equipment. Established in 1971, we have been designing and manufacturing lifting equipment for use in automotive, aerospace and defence applications and are now being asked to supply specialist lifting equipment for rail applications. We have developed a standard range of tools for handling components up to 1 Tonne in weight, although we have the technology to lift up to 40Tonnes!
Increasingly, we are being asked to work alongside the depot’s H&S team to develop safe methods of removing large, often heavy & frequently awkward shaped components from carriages, locos & wagons.
The most recent example of this is where we have been asked to provide tooling for the safe removal and refitting of the Holset adaptor on the cardan shaft of the Class 15X unit, fitted with a Cummins diesel engine, in service with GWR at Exeter. The Holset adaptor performs as an intermediate clutch on the prop shaft and it prone to wear. Before Majorlift’s involvement, this was a three-day job, requiring the engine to be dropped so the train was out of service and there was also potential for serious injury. Having worked successfully on previous projects, Majorlift were invited to review the procedure by GWR’s H&S team. Following an initial visit, a tool was produced, offered up, adjusted for fit and taken off site for completion and painting. The final product was delivered to site & GWR were astonished to find the Holset adaptor can now be replaced by two people in under three hours! This freed up the train to get back into revenue earning service. Due to the way the adaptor is held & manipulated, it is a very safe operation, with much reduced risk of injury.
Another stunning feature is that the Holset tool is fitted as an attachment to Majorlift’s proven Rail Jack, and so is a highly economical adaptor, rather than a completely new tool. This makes the Rail Jack a productive and very cost-effective addition to the workshop. We have already designed adaptors for use with accumulators, fans, gearboxes and alternators fitted beneath carriages & engines.
Although our Rail Jack runs on the pit floor, we are encouraging designers to include a “jack rail” in all new pits being installed. This allows users to future proof their facility by building in the ability to run lifting equipment – such as our industry leading commercial pit jack – along the length of the bay to support, remove and refit heavy components from anywhere under the carriage, wagon or locomotive being maintained.
Design and manufacture of all of our products happens in our factory just outside of Bristol. We used 3D Computer modelling to ensure that components are not over stressed and will be stable in use. We can also use the same software to model the underside of the rail vehicles and the pit to ensure we have the necessary space to carry out the work and to design mountings to fit the unit being serviced.
Our manufacturing facility uses modern CNC technology to machine 95% of the product from raw materials – including all the rams & cylinders, power packs and air motors. Retaining this inhouse allows us to rigorously control the quality of the products and the lead times to our customers. We have invested in a highly flexible manufacturing process that allows cost effective manufacture of small volumes of products.
Majorlift can produce large and small solutions, tailored to the customer’s needs – our largest application was to manufacture a bespoke lift for the removal and replacement of engines, gearboxes, cooler and fuel units from the Siemens Class 185 Diesel Train. Probably our smallest product is a turnbuckle, used for securing the trailing arm on bogies being moved for servicing.