What you need to know before buying a crane

Cranes are useful machines in several industries, including construction, warehousing, mining, transport, and bulk storage. They can be used to pull and lift material in a construction site, stack items, and load and offload freights; in the right hands, their applications are limitless.

While looking up cranes for sale, it’s essential to learn a few basics about cranes to help you make the right decision. Below are three crucial things you should keep in mind before purchasing or hiring a crane for your project.

Different types of cranes have various applications

Cranes come in different sizes, builds and forms. The various models of cranes are designed to take on different tasks. The most popular types of cranes that you’ll come across are tower cranes and mobile cranes.

Mobile cranes are mounted on heavy vehicles. They’re compact and can be moved around easily. This makes mobile cranes versatile and suitable for various applications including small constructions, erecting towers and bridges, and laying heavy pipes. Tower cranes are much more specialised than mobile cranes; they are mounted on the side of a building or wall to lift material onto very high floors.

Consider your work area and job requirements

Besides selecting the right type of crane, you also need to assess your project’s demands and constraints to work out the performance of the crane required. How is the terrain, what types of load do you need to move, how much does the load weigh? The reason why you need accurate answers to this question is that cranes are built to very particular specifications.

Every crane has a load limit, and can only extend its boom up to a specific length and height. Also, when it comes to mobile cranes, you have to consider the terrain; for very rough terrain, you need an all-terrain crane with wide outriggers.

Make sure to get a crane that meets the demands of the job. But then again, don’t spend too much on a crane that wildly surpasses those demands.

When to buy and when to hire

The decision to either buy or hire a crane should be determined by your budget and the duration or frequency of work. If you need a crane for only one small project, then it’s much more economical to hire. However, if the job is projected to take a long time or you frequently need to use cranes in multiple projects, then it makes economic sense to buy.

The choice of crane heavily depends on the nature of the job at hand. Make all the necessary considerations to ensure that the crane is used within its’s safe limits. Always use the right equipment for the job. Speaking of construction equipment, check out our used terrain cranes for sale and other construction machinery for sale in our catalogue. Get in touch with us via call or email for more information.