Wheelbarrows & Carts
Buy and sell wheelbarrows and carts in Panama.
The builder’s wheelbarrow tipping mortar beside a footing does a different job from the two-wheeled hand truck a delivery driver stacks cases of soda on, and both differ from the trolleys porters push when they wheel shoppers’ bags out to the car park at Merca Panamá. Platform carts, folding wagons for the beach or the market run and poly-tray barrows for the garden sit alongside them, new and pre-owned. The most useful line in any listing is the one that says which of these it is, because someone pricing a barrow for a footing has no use for a beach wagon.
The barrow, the hand truck and the platform cart:
each moves a load in its own way. The wheelbarrow balances its load in a tray over one wheel, so it tips mortar, gravel or soil exactly where you want it. The hand truck has two wheels and a steel nose plate that slides under a stack of boxes, a fridge or a gas cylinder before you tilt it back. A platform cart is a flat deck on casters for a smooth floor, and folding fabric wagons do the same job on sand. Convertible hand trucks switch from upright to flat. Whatever goes in the barrow comes from building materials, and the shovel that loads it from tools.
Steel tray or poly tray, one wheel or two:
a steel tray takes the edge of a shovel, wet concrete and the odd dropped block, which is why builders use it. A polyethylene tray is lighter, never rusts and suits soil, compost and feed, but broken concrete will gouge it. One wheel turns tightly and tips cleanly; two let the barrow stand on its own and steady a full load for someone unused to balancing one. Wooden handles can be replaced; tubular steel lasts longer outdoors. On a hand truck, read the load rating on the frame and match the wheels to the ground: solid ones for a shop or warehouse floor, air-filled ones for kerbs and gravel. A folding hand truck fits behind a door in an apartment, but it is built for boxes, not for a washing machine.
A light builder’s barrow against a convertible hand truck:
a light builder’s barrow of four to six cubic feet is around $30 to $40 new, which leaves little to save on a used one unless it is sound and cheap. Convertible hand trucks run well over $100 new and keep more of that second-hand, because the steel frame outlasts everything bolted to it. A replacement wheel is about $10, so a flat tyre or a worn bearing is a bargaining point; a cracked tray or a bent frame is not.
Spinning the wheel before you look at the paint:
lift the barrow by its handles and spin the wheel. It should turn freely and run true; a wobble or a grinding noise means a dry bearing or a bent axle. Check the bolts where the tray meets the frame, which shear or rust solid on a barrow that has carried concrete for years. A poly tray left in the sun turns chalky and brittle, cracking first at the corners and bolt holes. Chipped paint means nothing. On a hand truck, start with the nose plate. Bent upwards or cracked at the weld, it has been used as a pry bar and will drop a load one day. Wheels worn flat on one side tell you it spent years on a delivery round. On folding carts, work the frame open and shut a few times: the hinge pins and the catch fail first.
Handing on a barrow after the build, or a hand truck after the move:
put the type in the first line, or a listing that only says cart brings calls from people wanting another kind. For a wheelbarrow, give the tray material and capacity, the wheel type and whether the tyre holds air; for a hand truck, the load rating, the wheels and whether it folds or converts. Photograph it from the side and into the tray, with close-ups of the wheel, the nose plate and any rewelded joint. Sellers are often a builder in La Chorrera clearing the yard after handing over a house, or a family in David with a hand truck bought for one move. A barrow does not fold and rarely fits in a hatchback, so say whether the wheel comes off for the drive home.