SECTOR REPORT Ӏ ALL TERRAIN CRANES
at a refinery in Sicily; and a roof installation at a school in Bologna. Next to announce a purchase of the GMK 6450-1 was Schuch Heavylift, part of the Schuch Group, based in south west Germany. Schuch’s 450-tonner came as part of an eight crane order, announced in April 2023, which also included two GMK3060L-1s, one GMK5150XL, and four GMK5250XL-1s. The engineers at Lift Solutions customised this model further, allowing the boom to be removed to keep the 450t six axle crane within 10t per axle load limits. Manitowoc explains that to optimise driving without a boom a second suspension circuit was installed on the unique MegaDrive system, which adapts the chassis to the different axle loads. In September 2023 another German company, Hamburg’s Gustav Seeland, received its own unit of the 450-tonner – the first six-axle crane in its fleet. Like Schuch it has chosen to have the crane customised further to allow for the boom to be removed. Managing director Johann Evers said, “We’ve already seen very strong interest in the new crane.” And, in November, the first
sale of a GMK 6450-1 announced outside Europe took place, with Bridgetown, Barbados-based Crane & Equipment taking delivery of the crane. The company will use it on energy and infrastructure jobs on the Caribbean island. “We are very excited to add such an impressive crane to our fleet. We have built a reputation of providing top-of-the-line equipment to our customers in Barbados, and this new Grove will help us reinforce the highest standards of our services,” said James Bradshaw, owner of Crane & Equipment.
DIGITAL UPGRADE Manitowoc hasn’t announced the GMK 6450-1 as a production model, and emphasises its custom design. Liebherr’s latest upgrade has been well publicised, and is destined to be used across its range. LICCON3 is the third generation of the German manufacturer's crane control system. It was announced at Bauma, in October 2022, where the first two models to be offered with the system — the LTM 1110- 5.2 and LTM 1100-5.3 — made their debut. The LTM 1110-5.1 had been launched at the previous Bauma,
Schuch bought a
Grove GMK 6450-1 as part of an eight crane order
lifting 110t and with a 60m boom and 91m tip height. The crane featured: Hill Start Aid, Liebherr’s technology for driving off smoothly on gradients; VarioBase Plus, which offers improved capacity over the cranes rear; EcoMode, for efficient fuel use during lifting; and EcoDrive, for better fuel use on the road. The new, upgraded LTM 1110-5.2 has the same key features, but adds LICCON3 control, and a new cab (first shown in prototype in 2019). The first LTM 1110-5.2 was sold to Riga Mainz, and Emerson Crane Hire in the UK took delivery of its unit just before Christmas 2022. Liebherr has focussed on
easy roading for this 100t crane, allowing it to operate as a taxi crane with ballast on board both in those EU countries with lower axle limits, and in the US, where states’ and municipalities’ patchwork road regulations have traditionally made truck cranes dominant over all terrains in many fleets. At the same time, Liebherr says,
even owners in markets without the strictest axle load limits have requested more flexibility on loading, to ease obtaining licences and permits, particularly when these involve driving over
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