Construction and use of traveling gantry cranes

Gantry cranes are the most commonly used for lifting, raising, lowering down and shifting of heavy loads in industry or shipyards from different locations. The gantry cranes have steel fabricated structures in their main parts.

Construction of travelling gantry cranes:

Gantry cranes lift a load with the help of a hoist. The hoist is fixed to a movable trolley, which moves horizontally on rails fitted to a beam on the wheels under it. The crane has uprights supports and can move on the wheels. These cranes are more suitable for handling heavy loads. Huge gantry cranes are used in various industries like shipbuilding or for moving heavy loads in other industries. The gantry crane with tires or caster wheels is used in many industries. These movable gantry cranes are named workstation gantry cranes used for moving the materials, parts, and products between different workstations. These cranes may have I-beam, tracks or other extruded metal sections in their mechanism for lifting of loads. Many cranes do not move when lifting the loads. They move only in unloaded condition. The load capacity of a gantry crane is dependent on design and structure of the cranes.

Use of travelling gantry cranes:

Very common use of the travelling gantry cranes are there in rail yards, shipping docks and industries for loading, unloading and movement containers and of loads. In industry, they are employed for moving the items from floor to floor for production and assembly operations of products. In production and assembly operations, the material, parts, sub assemblies, or assemblies need to be frequently moved from one workstation to another. The loads are so heavy that it is impossible to handle them manually without the aid of material handling equipment. The gantry cranes help in the mobility efficiently. Final products are much heavier than the parts and require lifting and transferring them with the help of gantry cranes.

Parts of a mobile gantry crane.

Let us discuss about the various parts of a gantry crane. Two steel structured vertical columns support a horizontal beam at its ends. The beam carries a moveable lifting hanging mechanism called a spreader on it. The lifting mechanism can travel along the horizontal beam. The lifting mechanism is employed for lifting the load. The gantry cranes are mounted on four wheels at the corners for movement of crane. Two wheels are used for steering the crane while other two are driven by motor for movement over the floor. These wheels may be lined with rubber on the rim. The operator can move the crane to proper position, lift and raise the load and move the load to another location. It is difficult to control the movement of load due to swing resulting from the crane mechanism. It becomes more difficult, if the floor is filled with many machines and items and crane cannot move easily because of the obstructions to move it.