I am interested in buying a used all terrain crane for my company. I have worked extensively with friction cranes, and less so with rough terrain, but have little experience with all terrain models. I have a few questions: - What are specifics to be aware of while inspecting before a possible purchase? - What parts typically go first and need to be replaced? - Are there specific models in the 75-100 ton range that are better or worse than others? - If there were a potential to rent this crane to others - does that change what I should be looking for? I still employ friction cranes from the 50's and 60's for much of our day to day work... most all-terrains I see appear to have a much shorter lifespan. What is considered an "old" crane? Is a 10-15 year old crane considered old in a rental fleet? Any and all advice is much appreciated. - J
Old is sort of subjective. Our oldest crane crane is an 81. Our newest is a 97. We have one all terrain. I think it's a 92. It's a Krupp Kmk5090. AT's have a ton of moving parts. The suspensions are far from maintenance free. What we looked at when buying this crane was the range of jobs it would cover. We looked at some Kmk/Gmk cranes in the 80 to 100 ton range. What we saw is that it's takes the same amount of work to move an 80 as the 110t. Since we are a small company we bought the biggest crane we could mobilize with one truck and trailer. We bought ours from a crane service here in Indiana that was still using it everyday and had all the maintenance records and oil samples from the time they had bought it in 2000. Ours is also a two engine machine. The suspension is super sweet for rough, muddy jobs. That being said I think I'd rather have a truck crane. I think I would look at a late 90's Gmk4085 if I wanted an 80 ton 80T AT. Make double sure the suspension is working properly. As far as what to look for. Just your standard stuff I'd say. You can usually tell pretty quickly if a machine has been cared for or not. Wiring is always something I look at fairly closely. If the wiring harnesses are full of but connectors and off colored wires I'm probably not interested in the crane.
All terrains are great cranes, if you really need a all terrain. A 85 ton gmk, will hang 30,000lbs of counterweight, compared with a 75 ton link-belt truck crane (htc8675), which only has around 16,000 lbs. The all terrain has all wheel steer, automatic transmissions, hydraulic suspensions,etc. Unfortunately, they're usually mercedes power, zf transmissions, and all metric hoses and seals, and planetary axles. Parts can be difficult to source, and not easy to repair, or find someone used to working on them. The truck cranes are typically detroit, cat, or cummins powered, eaton transmissions, and regular truck axles and suspension. Parts are available at most good truck repair places. My Grove truck cranes, come with a pretty comprehensive service and parts manual. All terrains come only with a parts manual/ wiring diagram, and a back ground in german helps if its a older crane. They are very complicated, and the dealers would prefer to send you their mechanic, as help you figure out a problem. I always say you could air drop one of my old groves into south america, and fix most things on it with a crescent wrench, pipe wrench, and a big hammer (a few screwdrivers maybe). Take a look at the wiring loom size on a new all terrain. That and the size of the relay/control boxes and computer boards downstairs and upstairs. Engineers love stashing all that #$%@ in those million dollar rigs, but us poor suckers out here with a 30year old rig, fighting chafed wiring looms, corroded connections, and weak relays, are in big trouble. Engineers love variable voltage signals, millivolt differences controling engines and sensors, but I prefer off and on 12v or 24v when I'm trouble shooting. Give me a throttle controlled by a lever/rod over a glorified fan switch any day. At 20 years old, a lot of the computer boards are now no longer available. I've got 3, $4,000 load scales in my shop, all unusable because they no longer make the displays, and mine are unreadable. No parts available, but were sold new in 2001. If you can live with a 75 ton capacity, a truck crane is a much easier crane to own and maintain. Once you go over 100 ton capacity, your pretty much in all terrain territory. leibherr says service life on a new all terrain is 10years. If your mechanics are used to your friction rigs, the jump to a truck crane won't be bad, All terrains are a whole different game.