China goes big

Large crawler cranes were big news at the Bauma China exhibition in Shanghai last month. Standing out among a vast selection of cranes of many types at the 21 to 24 November show were lattice boom crawlers – from Chinese manufacturers – up to 600 tonnes capacity.

Hunan-based Zoomlion debuted the first unit of its 600 tonne capacity QUY600, which was the largest crane at the show. Yanming Xiong, Zoomlion vice president, told IC that it is the biggest crawler crane built in China and that the first unit was already sold. The company plans to expand the range upwards to a 1,200 tonne capacity model.

XCMG, China’s largest manufacturer of construction equipment, debuted its largest model, the QUY450, a 450 tonne lattice crawler crane. In addition to this and its eight smaller models, XCMG has plans for 550, 650 and 800 tonne models, Sam Shang, XCMG spokesman, told IC.

Also on display from Sany were a 400 tonner (the SCC4000) and a 250 tonner, the SCC2500. Sany will have an 800 tonner by the end of the year and a 600 tonner is in development as part of what will be a 10 model range, according to Philip Zhao, Sany promotion director.

An 800 tonne capacity crawler crane is on the drawing board at Fushun Excavator, which claims the largest share (50%) of China’s crawler crane market. Construction of a prototype is due to start around the middle of next year. Fushun exhibited 350, 150 and 70 tonners from its range of at least 12 models.

More details on these crawlers and the many other cranes and news from manufacturers at the Bauma China exhibition will appear in a future issue of IC.