A friend of mine here in Ohio owns this crane, or whats left of a crane. Its gas-electric. A flathead V8 engine drives a DC generator to produce current which is sent to individual electric motors for the drums, slew and travel functions. He is an electrical whiz and just loved the idea of an electric crane. Anyone have a guess who built it?
My (un) educated guess is a Coles - made in Great Britain
Wabco made an electric crane.But this dose not look like a wabco.My guess is General Electric,erly 1950's ?It may have been a military unit.I have know idea ,thats my best guess.
Yes I think he did say it was built by Cole. I don't think they were very popular in this country. Kind of an interesting design and ahead of its time but crane development went the direction of hydraulics instead of electric.
It is Coles crane...cant remember the model of it From Britan, a 4 cyl Perkins or a Leyland engine was the common choice Engine coupled to a generator, to a big electrical switchboard....too many wires for my liking Coles made some tough buggers.....good luck with the restoration of it...would make a lovely yard crane
hi Thanks for the info....
This type of boom setup was called a cantilever type, with the pivot point being in the middle(ish). I know Coles used it, as well as Jones, not sure about anyone else though
I can confirm that it is definitely a Coles , made in Sunderland, UK. There are still dozens in use over here.
Are Coles still popular in Europe? I run an crane advertising website and havent had one listing for Coles.
Yes they are, but as a rule, not out on general hire. Most of them are in steel stock yards, junk yards and machine shops.
Okay, so they are not for commercial hire for the most part?
There are a few "one man bands" running them on commercial hire (small 12t, 25/28t telescopics) in the UK, but countries like Malta and Cyprus have more on commercial hire than the UK.
A generic term for that kind of rig is a 'wagon crane'. Cool pic too.
To see the popularity of the Coles cranes go to a tractor supply and buy a copy of Classic Plant and Machinery mag and several other UK tractor mags and they have a ton of them in home shops.
Old rig! This link is to my photobucket page but shows a real dinosaur that I found during my ride to North Pole Alaska on my Road Star Raider m/c last summer. It's a manual friction cable operated shovel, but much like the old lift cranes of it's time. Those were the days, when the op and his oiler could adjust and repair their own rigs, and they actually had feel feedback thru the levers and and pedals, unlike todays 'smart cranes'. http://s1029.photobucket.com/albums...Day 13 from Beaver Creek YK to North Pole AK/