BELOW THE HOOK
HANG IN THERE
A hook can fit in a hole in a load. Simple; easy; but not always possible. Or slings can be rigged between the hook and the load. This can be time-consuming, insecure and can expose operators to possible risk. Specialised below-the-hook devices are the answer. Julian Champkin reports.
the lightweight to the heaviest capacities. Ingenious methods to attach to a load are sometimes needed, and here engineers can display great imagination. But there is more to below-the-hook devices than simply finding ways to grip an awkward load. Chains and shackles sometimes require specialised materials for ATEX, clean-room and other applications. Wireless communication of data can be another requirement. Digital devices for weighing loads – to warn against overload, for example – and measuring tensions add to safety, but their data-logging contributes to efficiency and can be integrated into Industry 4.0 automation and productivity gains. Manufacturers of below-the-hook devices
B
are equally varied. Some specialise in one or other of the applications we have described; some are more broad-ranging. Wisconsin-based Caldwell, for example, have just celebrated their 70th year in business and would fit into the latter category. In that time they have accumulated, by acquisition or growth, expertise in vacuum units, coil hooks, heavy mill duty processing equipment, turner units that rotate big weldments and chassis for cars and trucks. “We make anything that goes below the hook,“ says Jeff Ferchen, their director of business development, “and we have a lot of standard products, but 60% of everything that we do is custom made.” To that end, Caldwell have created SmartSpec. An online computer programme that lets customers modify standard products to fit their own individual needs. Customers log on
28 | December 2025 |
www.hoistmagazine.com
elow the hook devices are many and varied. They range from the simple to the sophisticated, from
where it shows Caldwell’s standard products, and then asks ‘do you want it bigger, smaller, or padded to protect your load, or with shackles in different places?’ It will do the calculations and do the drawings to get it the way you want it. “Previously you had to go through our engineering group, which would take three to five days to get to an engineering proposal design to review,” says Ferchen. “Now it takes three to five minutes.” So that’s an example of how we have worked on the customisation of lifting devices over the years. An exact marriage between load and lifting devices – and the client’s philosophy – pays dividends, he says. He gives an example of a large agricultural machinery manufacturer. (John Deere is one of their clients.) They might be redoing their manufacturing line for their tractors and wanting to lift a cab door panel onto its unit. It could be done by hand, he says, “but workforces are changing, people of different sizes and both genders are picking up these parts, and John Deere has a policy that if anything weighs over 35lbs (16kg) they will offer the operator a below-the-hook lifting device rather than insisting it be lifted by hand. That is just John Deere’s requirement, it is not general. So we are trying to create something, just a small device, that will plug onto that panel.” But it is about more than finding a way to attach to the load to grip it for lifting. A person has to fit that device, and you have to make it easy and comfortable for that person. “This is exactly the kind of situation where you get into ergonomics and how people install things. On small loads like that details become all-important.” Caldwell also do high-capacity BTH devices, for loads like steel and aluminium coils for
A 37.5-tonne Caldwell coil grab beneath the hook of a 40-tonne overhead crane in Alabama.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79
