500 US ton Liebherr does duty in a hole

After nine months of planning, All Crane Rental of Pennsylvania used its 500 US ton capacity LTM 1400-7.1 Liebherr to help a general contractor retube a major boiler to restore power at a power plant in Masontown, PA, in the US.

The job involved lifting out the old boiler parts and lowering the new ones, but there was a huge obstacle. The only place to put the Liebherr hydraulic telescopic crane for access to the boiler was in a very tight space, a deep hole immediately adjacent to the building. The operation was completed late in 2007.

It took more than a week to assemble the crane (with the assistance of a 130 ton rough terrain crane owned by All Crane), and the jib had to be landed onto a fifth-floor level of the building and assembled there. A Y-guy boom suspension superlift attachment provided extra capacity. To perform the lifts needed, the crane was rigged with 186 feet of main boom and a 151 foot luffing jib.