In 1998 Redmond Gary Australia had been manufacturing cable handling equipment like cable trailers and winches for Telstra and electricity authorities throughout Australia. We had a good reputation and were approached by the head engineer from Sydney Electricity who wanted Redmond Gary Australia to start manufacturing MEWPs.

At that time RGA had zero experience with this type of equipment and so after investigation it was put in the too hard basket. However, after repeated requests from Sydney Electricity, RGA decided to take up the challenge and the federal government awarded RGA a grant for 50% of the design costs.

The first thing we did as part of the R & D process was to visit and talk to electricity authorities throughout Australia and studied the pole configurations and construction methods used by authorities and contractors. We used this information in our initial research to investigate the optimum boom configuration.

We were lucky to find an experienced engineer who had worked for Abbey Equipment for many years designing elbow type MEWPs, his name is Graeme Voucher who was later the founder of Nifty Lift Australia.

The Telefly boom design was eventually selected and was very different from other MEWPs at the time, and offered many advantages compared to elbow type MEWPs that were widely used. The design work and prototype took over 2 years to complete. When the prototype TF13M was complete we took it on a road trip visiting customers and contractors in Queensland, NSW and Victoria. We got positive feedback from many customers but because the boom configuration was so different, customers needed to re think how the MEWP would be used.

The first order came from a tree service company in Victoria followed by an order from Telstra for 5 x TF13M’s. about a year or so after we had completed the road trip and demonstrations, we started to receive orders from electricity authorities.

The first MEWP serial number 001 is owned by Bunbury Tree Works in Western Australia and is now 33 years old. Through its life it has had many owners and re builds. The machine is still in daily service and the owner commented that it is still working very well and has smooth and easy operations.