Tower Cranes Grow to New Heights
Within the tower crane industry, the 1950s featured many significant milestones in tower crane development and design. There were a range of manufacturers were starting to produce more bottom slewing cranes which had telescoping mast. These equipments dominated the construction market for both office and apartment block construction. A lot of of the top tower crane manufacturers didn't use cantilever jib designs. As an alternative, they made the switch to luffing jibs and eventually, the use of luffing jibs became the regular practice.
In Europe, there were key improvements being made in the design and development of tower cranes. Usually, construction sites were constricted areas. Depending on rail systems to transport a large number of tower cranes, became very expensive and inconvenient. A number of manufacturers were offering saddle jib cranes which had hook heights of 262 feet or 80 meters. These kinds of cranes were outfitted with self-climbing mechanisms which enabled sections of mast to be inserted into the crane so that it can grow along with the structures it was constructing upwards.
These specific cranes have long jibs and could cover a bigger work area. All of these developments resulted in the practice of constructing and anchoring cranes inside a building's lift shaft. After that, this is the technique that became the industry standard.
From the 1960s, the main focus on tower crane design and development started to cover a higher load moment, covering a larger job radius, faster erection strategies, climbing mechanisms and technology, and new control systems. Moreover, focus was spent on faster erection strategies with the most essential developments being made in the drive technology department, among other things.