Home made jib crane for the shop

[Dave J]

Hi,
I built this crane a few years back and thought I would post it here.
Some may have already seen it but I though a lot of new guys may have not.

I will post in the next few months about a bridge crane I am building. It has 7.6 meter runways and 3.6 meter span.

After some research on the internet (not much out there) I built this jib crane. It was made of scrap that I picked up in a dumpster and the main post a mate gave to me.
The beam is 150mm x 75 (6"x3") and is 2.3 mtrs (7.5ft) long made up of 2 pieces welded together. The vertical leg is 1mtr (3.2ft) long.









The bearings retainers are from the rear diff of a Nissan 720 4x4 pickup with a standard 30mm inner bearing in the top retainer and the bottom one with the original taper bearing from the axle. There is a 40mm (13/4”) square trailer axle machined at both ends to suit the bearings welded to the back of the crane. I made plates up to go around them and welded them to the crane as extra insurance.

I made the brackets up to hold the bearing retainers are out of 10mm (3/8") plate and they bolt onto the 100x100mm (4"x4") thick wall post. They bolt on to the post with 4 x 20mm (3/4) HT bolts top and bottom. I welded the nuts to a 300mm x 90 x 6mm ((1’x 3 1/2”x1/4”) plates top and bottom and then slid the plates inside the post while it was laying on the ground. A couple of small countersunk bolts hold them in place until the post goes up and the bolts go in. The top plates are 150 x 150x 10mm (6”x6”x3/8) with the same 20mm bolts and the bottom plate is 300x175x20mm (1’x7”x3/4) with 5x 16mm (5/8) pins into the concrete. I made the dummy bolts at the bottom because it has to be removed to another location latter. They have a hex head but no thread and are hammered 75mm (3”)into the tight fitting hole in the concrete.














You will see in the photo that I made up some temporary angle brackets with thread bar to do the final adjustments to the post when the crane was up, before welding the bottom. I was lucky I did that as when I first put it up it needed to go higher than I thought. So I lifted it 150mm higher and had to redrill more holes and plug up the old ones.



The beam trolley is made up to suit the electric winch and I had an old beam trolley that I got the wheels off.





Just after getting it up I decided I needed a cable festoon for the electric wires so I found a deal on eBay plastic wheels and made some trolleys up out of 3mm (1/8”) plate.
I made it so the controller is separate from the winch and left provision for the power controls that I will be fitting latter to move it in and out and side to side.







I haven’t used it alot and it has stood up to the task and have even lifted my 400 odd kg lathe with it. All up it only cost me $25Aus dollars and that was for the stickers and the festoon wheels.

Dave

[EdK]

Dave,

Nice tool to have in the shop and for $25Aus dollars, it's a no-brainer.

Ed

[stevec]

Excellent job! I especially admire the protective work attire on the chap in the 2nd pic. Foot wear shows ultimate faith in the crane.

[Dave J]

LOL, thats me (only I don't have the long hair these days)
I have full faith in the crane, those are 20mm bolts which have nuts welded to a 5mm plate inside the post. Also I put that much welding into it and even added an extra collar around the top pivot pin, so not going anywhere anytime.

Dave

[doubleboost]

Interesting project
If you look up "Kieth Fenner " on you tube he has a very handy shop crane
John

[TomG]

Nice job on the crane Dave. You don't have to use it a lot to enjoy it, although it looks to be in a great location to lift and store the vise on your mill.

I can't see from the pics, but is there a pendant for the up/down buttons? Also, how did you arrive at the load rating and did you proof test it?

Tom

[the penguin]

The jib crane I did on the Franken-Mill, while it nowhere as fancy as this one, I extremely happy with it, everytime I have to lift the 10" rotary table and its 10" chuck, I getting too old to dead lift that kind of weight anymore.

[Dave J]

Hi Tom, thanks
There is a pendant (the standard one that comes with these hoists) it is attached to the spring balancer so when you bend down to hook something up it comes with you. You can just see it in picture 4 under the quill of the mill.

With the load rating I did my home work over a long time before building it. I went to a few jib crane manufacturers sites and this size steel was being sold on 1 ton cranes, so plenty for 0.5 ton. I have lifted 400 odd kg on it but that was a one off as I only built it to lift the rotary table etc.

I placed the 500kg stickers on it because that is the maximum load for the hoist, but would be comfortable placing a 1 ton chain block on it and lifting 1 ton no problems. I built in a rise in the jib of around 5mm over the full distance, you need to allow that so the jib will be strait when fully loaded as the steel will flex. I picked up this tip on the crane sites.

All the welds are deep V'ed out for good penetration and I have added a few pieces to over strengthen it around the pivots.

Dave

[Dave J]

Just to add, with the crane loaded at 500kg at the tip, the post will be seeing around 1 ton push and pull at the pivots. In one picture you can see a silver diagonal brace I fitted to the shed and it does not move one bit when loaded.

I did months of research on this before building it, and have done the same for the new bridge crane I am building. The last thing I want to happen is it to fail and fall on someone or myself.

Dave

[Dave J]

(04-08-2013, 05:26 PM)the penguin Wrote: The jib crane I did on the Franken-Mill, while it nowhere as fancy as this one, I extremely happy with it, everytime I have to lift the 10" rotary table and its 10" chuck, I getting too old to dead lift that kind of weight anymore.

Thats the exact reason I built mine, makes easy work of the larger 10 inch table and chuck.
Speaking of chuck I will post up about it in another thread.

Dave