In the 2600-square-foot Pro Tool Reviews shop, we have a lot of moveable storage pieces. To move those items around, and give us a more flexible space, we use a Jet pallet jack. In particular, we chose the Jet PTW-2048B 20″ x 48″ pallet jack (identical to the Jet PTW-2048A). This Jet pallet jack, or pallet truck, has a 6600 lb capacity and narrow 20-inch wide forks. The capacity and compact design let us grab cabinets, pallets, and even custom-designed material racks and move them around the shop as needed. We’ll go over how we use it and see if this type of Jet pallet jack might be a good fit for your shop or small warehouse space.

Ironically, our pallet jack was delivered using…another pallet jack. That just made us laugh as we saw the first illustration of the value of this handy tool. All we had to do to get it up and running was install the handle. The provided instructions made this task easy, and it took just 5 minutes.

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What to Look for in a Jet Pallet Jack for Your Shop

Fork Width

When we started shopping around for a pallet jack for our shop, we had several things in mind. First, we get a lot of deliveries. Sometimes these include large pallets with anything from tool chests to battery-powered zero-turn mowers. We wanted a compact solution—hence the choice of the 20-inch wide forks over the larger 27-inch forks. This lets us move around full-size pallets, but also access narrower spaces and products that don’t require that larger truck width. It limits us on larger, top-heavy items, but we don’t typically deal with a lot of that sort of material on a regular basis.

Jet Pallet Jack Review PTW-2048B — The narrow forks work well for anything but the most top-heavy items.

Large Steer and Load Wheels

You want nice, large wheels on your pallet jack. Most pallet jacks cover this fairly well. The Jet Tools PTW-2048B pallet truck uses a pair of 6-1/4″ x 2″ steer wheels for maneuvering your load. Pallet jacks typically have larger wheels—some are as large as 7-inches or more in diameter. The wheels on this Jet pallet truck move very smoothly—even with heavier loads, so the overall design works well with the compact nature of this tool.

Jet Pallet Jack polyurethane steer wheels

The load wheel size on this truck is 2-7/8 x 3-11/16, giving ample area to the non-steering side of the jack.

Steering and Maneuverability

Most pallet jacks and trucks, including the PTW-2048B from Jet Tools, allow for good maneuverability. You get a full 200-degree turning radius on this one. Some jacks we’ve used have around 180 to 190 degrees so you get some extra dexterity with this tool. It helps when you end up near a wall or doorway and still need to maneuver to get the load where you want it.

Raised and Lowered Fork Height

Both the raised and lowered fork heights matter when using a pallet jack. The Jet pallet truck delivers a nice, low 2.95-inch clearance and 7-1/2 inches of height when fully raised. That lets it easily fit underneath standard pallets as well as several storage cabinets we needed to move around. The 7.5 inches of fork height made sure our pallets got over the lip of our shop foundation easily and without scraping the concrete. The polyurethane wheels (all four of them) look durable and we expect many years of use out of them.

Easy-to-Use Controls

Any good-quality pallet jack or truck should have easy-to-use controls. In the case of the Jet Tools PTW-2048B, you get the choice of using the hand or foot controls to lower your load. That comes in handy (pun intended) when you want to use a single-hand operation to drop the load.

Using the Jet Pallet Jack in Our Shop

We recently insulated our shop in preparation for adding a central AC unit and heat pump. We do a lot of work in the shop and while installing radiant barrier helped, we still weren’t quite there. When pallets of R-19 and R-30 insulation started arriving, not to mention buckets of drywall mud and other needed items, the Jet PTW-2048B pallet truck gave us a way to keep our shop’s ingress and egress points clear.

Aside from playing musical chairs with pallets to let our drywall crew get their work done, we also used the Jet pallet jack to move around several other items. First, we have a wood material rack that holds more than a ton of dimensional lumber, OSB, plywood, LVL, and trim material used in our product testing. We initially built it on a set of heavy-duty casters. However, we quickly found that a pallet jack provided a much simpler means of moving around this heavyweight behemoth.

We also have several cabinets that we relocate from time to time. We intend to build custom pallets to let us move those at will, creating additional space in the corner of the shop for testing products. While we haven’t yet built the pallets, even moving the cabinets with just the pallet jack works since the minimum fork height lets us sneak underneath and get them off the ground.

Available Models and Sizes

The Jet PTW series pallet jack comes in five “flavors”, letting you choose between fork depths of 36–48 inches and fork spreads of the compact 20 inches to the more common 27 inches. If you need something more robust, the Jet JTX Series increases the load capacity to 8,000 pounds. Conversely, their JT Series provides options with a narrow 16″ pallet jack width up to 27 x 48-inch models. The JT line supports up to 5,500 pounds.

Model	Capacity	Turning Radius	Fork Dimensions	Max Height	Fork Width
PTW-2036B	6600 lbs.	200º	36 x 20-1/2 in.	7-1/2 in.	6-1/4 in.
PTW-2042B	6600 lbs.	200º	42 x 20-1/2 in.	7-1/2 in.	6-1/4 in.
PTW-2048B	6600 lbs.	200º	48 x 20-1/2 in.	7-1/2 in.	6-1/4 in.
PTW-2742B	6600 lbs.	200º	42 x 27 in.	7-1/2 in.	6-1/4 in.
PTW-2748B	6600 lbs.	200º	48 x 27 in.	7-1/2 in.	6-1/4 in.

Final Thoughts

At a retail price of around $596, the Jet PTW-2048B pallet jack is an excellent value. It should fit the bill for most applications requiring a full-depth, narrow pallet truck. It’s a great solution for anyone looking to move materials around while not requiring the floor space or clearance a full-size pallet jack occupies. Varying the pallet jack width and depth barely budges the price of these tools, so get what you need for your particular application.