When operations compare forklifts, the conversation usually starts and ends with the purchase price. That is the one number everyone can see, and it is almost never the number that decides which truck is cheaper to own. Total cost of ownership — what the truck costs you over its whole working life — is where the real difference between lithium-ion and internal combustion shows up.
Start with energy. An internal-combustion truck burns LP gas or diesel every hour it runs, and that fuel is a recurring line item you feel every week. A lithium-ion truck draws electricity, and it opportunity-charges: operators plug in during breaks and lunch instead of swapping batteries or refuelling. There is no battery room, no watering, no equalize cycles, and no fuel delivery to schedule.
Then look at maintenance. Internal-combustion engines have a long list of wear items — filters, fluids, belts, exhaust components — that need attention on a schedule whether the truck is busy or not. An integrated lithium-ion drivetrain has far fewer moving parts to service, which means fewer planned maintenance hours and fewer surprise ones.
Uptime is the line that is hardest to put on a spreadsheet and often matters most. A truck that charges in place during breaks is a truck that is available for the next shift without a battery change or a fuel stop. For a multi-shift operation, that recovered availability can be worth more than the fuel and maintenance savings combined.
None of this makes internal combustion the wrong choice everywhere. Outdoor yards, heavy loads, and duty cycles with no room to opportunity-charge still favour IC in plenty of operations. The point is simpler than any single answer: compare the trucks across the years you will own them, not just the day you buy them. When you add up energy, maintenance, and uptime over that horizon, the ranking often looks different than the sticker price suggested.
If you want to run those numbers against your own shift pattern and throughput, that is exactly the conversation our team is built for. Request a quote and we will walk the comparison with you.