Development of a special sidelifter for transferring containers between railroad freight cars and trailers

In this study, a container loading and unloading mechanism which is assembled on a semi-trailer, is designed and manufactured. This design is supported with a mechanism which can be adjusted according to different dimensioned ISO standard containers. The main requirement of the above mentioned mechanism is the ability of loading and unloading of ISO containers up to 12,192 m long on every ground condition except at very soft and slope grounds. Design concepts created in this manner are firstly tested by the analysis softwares. The analysis results are then used in selecting the most successful design concept to be manufactured as a prototype for performance tests. The results of the performance tests are also presented.