To ensure you can complete a task right, and stay under budget, learn the many uses and varieties of construction equipment. One of the biggest and most important varieties are cranes.
There are dozens of different types of crane functions. These functions depend on the way the crane is built as well as the crane’s intended purpose.
To get a better grip on what you need from a crane, let’s look at seven of the primary crane functions and the cranes that provide them.
1. Crawler Crane
The crawler crane switches out the standard wheels of the other varieties for sturdy tracks. This is to navigate soft and uneven terrain, which is common in many dig sites.
To help increase its adaptive style, some crawler cranes even include a telescopic boom. These help to change the height and angle of the pulley system.
2. Floating Crane
Floating cranes are additions to boats, either built-in or linked next to. This function helps to build and repair oil rigs as well as the occasional ship stranded at sea.
The floating crane is a highly specialized crane. It will often need an extra set of skills and demands to deal with the boat setup.
3. Rough Terrain Crane
For the more solid terrain, the rough terrain crane has four massive, rubber tires and four-wheel drive. This allows it to move over rocks and debris to get where it needs to. Due to the uneven ground, it often has the most adjustable crane system.
4. Truck-Mounted Crane
Truck-mounted cranes have the critical advantage of being able to travel on highways and other paved road locations.
The crane mounts into a bed of a small truck. The truck comes with counterweights and outriggers to help keep a strong stabilization while the crane operates.
5. Bridge Crane
Bridge cranes are one of the fixed cranes. Its name comes from its shape, where it has two massive steel beams supported by structures on either end.
The crane hoist is in the middle and slides along the beams to reach anything beneath it. This is a common crane for industrial stations with fixed places in the production line.
6. Bulk-Handling Crane
Instead of changes to the crane set up and support structure, bulk-handling cranes have a big difference at the end of the pulley system.
Bulk-handling cranes have a large and unique grabbing mechanism that opens wide to cover a large amount of material and clamps shut to move it elsewhere.
7. Tower Crane
The common crane of the skyscrapers, tower cranes, have an incredible advantage of height. It also provides some power in the lifting department, using an entire hydraulic system to pull items up along its vertical post using its horizontal crane arm.
Due to the height of tower cranes, construction crews build them alongside the buildings they serve. This can mean extra hours of construction and maintenance.
Getting the Most out of Crane Functions
These seven crane functions will cover most of the essential encounters you may have to deal with on a construction site.
Once you have the core of what you need out of a crane, it will make buying parts and rentals easier. Contact us today for information about crane parts and services.