A stairclimber is a type of trolley

Cart

A cart is a vehicle designed for transport, using two wheels and normally pulled by one or a pair of draught animals. A handcart is pulled or pushed by one or more people...

 fitted with rotating wheels or tracks so that it can be pushed or pulled up or down a stairway

Stairway

Stairway, staircase, stairwell, flight of stairs, or simply stairs are names for a construction designed to bridge a large vertical distance by dividing it into smaller vertical distances, called steps...

. Stairclimbers can be manual or battery-powered, and are commonly found in wheel, track, and walker variants.

Stairclimber wheels

Stairclimber wheels can be fitted to hand truck

Hand truck

A hand truck, also known as a Hannibal lectern, two wheeler, stack truck, dolly, trolley, trolley truck, sack barrow, sack truck, or bag barrow, is an L-shaped box-moving handcart with handles at one end, wheels at the base, with a small ledge to set objects on, flat against the floor when the...

s (sack trucks) and as the name implies, are designed to aid the moving of goods up or down stairs. This type of stairclimber relies on a wheel configuration known as tri-star

Tri-star (wheel arrangement)

The tri-star is a novel wheel design—originally by Robert and John Forsyth, assignors to Lockheed in 1967—in which three wheels are arranged in an upright triangle with two on the ground and one above them. If either of the wheels in contact with the ground gets stuck, the whole system rotates over...

, three wheels set into a triangle configuration replacing the standard wheel on either side. Stairclimber wheels can sometimes be problematic when trying to turn on flat ground as four wheels in a fixed position will be in contact with the ground at all times unless a locking mechanism is built into the trolley.

Track type

Sometimes a rotary rubber track is fitted to the rear of the trolley instead of using a triangular wheel configuration, and the trolley is pulled with the track in contact with the stairs. Using this method allows the trolley to have 2 standard wheels allowing easy of movement on flat ground. This type of stairclimber can also have an electric powered track, helping save time and energy when moving heavy loads.

Stair walkers

The stair walkers have an arm fitted to the rear of the truck that folds out and down, pushing on the step above and in so doing lifting the truck up in an arc to rest on that step. Repetitions of this movement allow the truck to move up the stairs.