What drives the cost of a crane investment

When a crane price is asked for, the expected answer is a single figure. Yet two cranes of the same tonnage can differ by a factor of two. These are the items that make the difference.

Span

Girder section does not grow linearly with span; it accelerates. Narrowing the span by two metres saves more than most expect. Establishing the width actually needed while planning the rail track beats any later optimisation.

Duty class

As FEM class rises, gearbox, brake, rope and load-bearing structure all grow. Buying a high-class crane for a facility making ten lifts a day is paying for strength that will not be used. The reverse also holds: a crane specified too low fatigues early, and the maintenance cost exceeds the difference that would have been paid up front.

Runway and structure

The track the crane runs on is a cost alongside the crane itself. If column and roof reinforcement is needed in an existing building, this item can approach the price of the crane. In a gantry layout, floor rail and foundation work take its place.

Installation and commissioning

Installation time depends on how the crane is brought into the building and on site conditions. Installation that halts production in a working facility is planned differently from work in an empty building.

The invisible item: downtime

The most expensive item usually does not appear on the quote. Production downtime caused by a wrongly specified crane soon exceeds whatever was saved on the initial investment.