Twice a week they march down your street. You may hear them, you may not, but without them, you would be lost in a disarray of misery. No, this is no exaggeration. Without these large metal saviors, our lives would be, well…garbage. Could you imagine the world without garbage trucks? Seriously, think about it. Every bag you fill would have to be taken personally down to a dump since what we know as dumpsters now would turn into dumps of their own anyways. Every leak, smell, and piece left behind would fill your car, your street, or your building basement, and life as we know it would simply come to an end. Well not really, but it would definitely suck. The thing is, we never really think about how important garbage trucks are and therefore, we don't know nearly as much about them as we should. Lets start with the different types of garbage trucks for sale that exist.

There are three main types of garbage trucks that we see on a regular basis. First, there are front loading garbage trucks. Front loading garbage or trash trucks are probably what you will see outside your office building as these types  generally service commercial and industrial businesses using large waste containers with lids we all have learned to know as dumpsters. The front-loading process of garbage trucks begins with automated forks on the front. Drivers of used garbage trucks for sale will carefully align the forks with sleeves on the waste container using the operational controls inside of the truck. The waste container is then lifted over the truck and flipped upside down for the waste or recyclable material to empty into the vehicle's hopper or storage unit. Once the waste is dumped, it is compacted by a hydraulically powered moving wall that oscillates backwards and forwards to push the waste to the rear of the trash truck. When the body of the truck is full, the compaction wall moves all the way to the rear of the body, ejecting it via an open tailgate.

Alongside front-loading garbage trucks for sale, there are also side loader garbage trucks. These trucks are loaded from the side, either manually, or with the assistance of an automated lift, referred to as automated side loaders. An Automated Side Loader only needs one operator, where a traditional rear load garbage truck may require two or three people, and has the additional advantage of reducing on the job injuries due to repetitive heavy lifting. As with front loading garbage trucks, the compaction mechanism comprises a metal pusher plate in the collection hopper, which oscillates backwards and forwards under hydraulic pressure, pushing the refuse through an aperture, thus compacting it against the material already loaded. Using a continuously reciprocating wall within the loading hopper, the waste is forced through an opening in the main body and therefore compacted towards the rear of the truck.

Finally, a garbage truck for sale can be a Rear loader. Rear-loading garbage trucks have an opening at the rear that a truck operator, waste collector, or automatic lifting mechanism can toss waste bags or empty the contents of waste bins into. Some rear loading garbage trucks will have an automatic loading mechanism built into a groove in the back of the truck. The truck will have a chain or cable system for upending the container. The waste will then slide into the hopper of the truck. Once loaded, the rear loader compacts the waste using a mechanism, powered by hydraulics, that employs a moving plate or shovel to scoop the waste out from the loading hopper and compress it against a moving wall. These plates are designed to apply point pressure to the waste to break down bulky items in the hopper before being drawn into the main body of the truck.

Keep reading to find out more about used garbage trucks for sale and how they keep our lives clean and fresh every day.