Electric lift trucks are now one of the most common lithium-ion fire risks in a warehouse — and the least planned for. A forklift or pallet jack in thermal runaway sits in the middle of your racking, near your inventory, often on charge and unattended overnight. The Steel Guard Forklift Fire Blanket is sized to cover the whole machine, contain the fire, block radiant heat, and buy your building the time that a fire extinguisher can't.

This is a heavy-duty reusable blanket, not a disposable drape. It's cut and sewn in our US factory from Draft-Tex™ fabric, built on Newtex Z-Block® silicone-coated fiberglass rated 1,800°F (982°C) continuous, and constructed to the design and test parameters of DIN SPEC 91489:2024-11 — the European standard for lithium-ion fire blankets. Part of our lithium battery fire protection line.

Two Standard Sizes

Sized to the two equipment classes that cover most warehouse fleets. Both ship as complete kits with storage bag and documentation pack.

• 16' × 16' — electric pallet jacks, walkie stackers, reach trucks, and order pickers. The everyday warehouse machine. $2,195
• 23' × 23' — sit-down counterbalance forklifts and larger lift trucks, including battery-compartment coverage with full ground overlap. $3,295
• Custom size — telehandlers, tuggers, AGVs, or anything non-standard. Enter your dimensions for instant pricing; produced in 2–3 weeks.

Sizing to Your Equipment

The rule is simple: the blanket must cover the truck completely and lie flat on the floor at least 20 inches (0.5 m) past it on every side. That ground overlap is what starves the fire and blocks radiant heat from reaching your racking. Measure your largest truck's length and width, add roughly 40 inches to each, and round up. Most Class III equipment lands in the 16' × 16'; most Class I and IV counterbalance trucks need the 23' × 23'.

If your fleet spans both classes, the 23' × 23' covers everything — worth considering if you're standardizing one blanket across multiple charging stations rather than stocking two sizes.

Built for Two-Person Deployment

A blanket this size is only useful if two people can actually deploy it under stress. Ours is built around that: every deployment loop is red for instant identification in smoke, corner loops are supplemented with side-edge loops so no grab point is more than about six feet apart, and every loop is a 2-inch reinforced strap on a backed doubler, built and tested to a 125 kg (275 lb) shock load. The deployment works as a controlled drag — two people take the leading corners and pull the blanket over the truck while side crews walk alongside, so nobody reaches across the leading edge.

Reusable — Which Matters More at This Size

Most forklift-sized blankets on the US market are single-use imports: one deployment and a $1,400 blanket is scrap. At this price point that distinction compounds fast. Ours is engineered for a working life — deploy it in drills, train your team on it, inspect it quarterly, clean it, refold it, and put it back on the wall. Only after exposure to an actual fire is it retired, which is true of any lithium-ion blanket, because the coating in the contact zone sacrifices itself to protect the fabric beneath. If you run annual fire drills, a reusable blanket pays for itself against a disposable in the first training cycle.

Fleet Orders

Outfitting multiple charging stations or standardizing across sites is where buying from the manufacturer changes the math. Imported blankets are stocked in limited quantities in the US, with backorders running up to three months and popular sizes routinely showing sold out — which is fine for one unit and impossible for a rollout. Because we manufacture domestically, fleet orders of 30 or more are produced in 2–3 weeks, custom sizes in the same window, and stocked sizes ship in 1–2 business days. Your order goes onto our cutting table, not onto a boat. Contact us for fleet pricing.

What's Included

Every blanket ships as a complete, deployment-ready kit — not a folded blanket in a box.

• The blanket — Draft-Tex™ construction, serialized, with permanent identification label
• Storage container — weatherproof carry bag on the 16' × 16'; the 23' × 23' ships with a wheeled storage box, since a 60+ lb blanket is a two-person carry and the box doubles as the deployment cart
• Weatherproof document pouch — mounted to the blanket, readable without unpacking
• Audit-ready documentation pack — laminated emergency deployment card, serialized product identification record, safety and use information, and an inspection & service log

The serial number ties each unit to its build record in our files, so if an insurer, EHS auditor, or fire marshal asks what this blanket is and how it's been maintained, the answer is in the pouch.

Optional add-on: a wall-mounted Station Kit case — our sewn rip-open vinyl case that keeps the blanket mounted and instantly deployable at each charging bay, with the deployment card visible on the face. Recommended when blankets live at fixed charging stations rather than traveling with a response team.

Reusable Heavy-Duty vs. Single-Use Drape