Final Product

The following displays our final product, costs, materials and stress calculation results.

The Product:

The above image shows our crane. It is a gantry crane, the beam itself is 5m long, the legs are 1.5 metres long and the leg struts are 1m long.

Lifting Mechanism:
Clarke CNP 1250 Heavy Duty Power Puller

This winch was chosen because:
Lifting loads of up to 1250kg
Cable length of 3070mm
Cost = £21.14 including VAT
Limited parts so less can go wrong
Simple to use
No need for external power supply (fully manual)

Transport Mechanism:

This roller mechanism was chosen because:
Price = £46.98
Suitable for all winches and loads of up to 5440kg's
No need of external power supply

Chosen Beam Structure:

Hollow square cross section beam
Chosen because:
Can withstand vertical and horizontal shear and bending which would suit the purpose of this crane as load will be swinging so load not only in the vertical direction. Allows for worst case scenarios.

Stress calculation results:

Maximum deflection at worst case on the beam (center, 2.5m) is 4mm.
Buckling in the leg structs would occur at a load of 37730.61kN
The load at which the legs would start to plastically deform is 4000kN

All these results show that our crane can cope under the 1000kg load.

Material:

We have opted to use aluminium instead of steel for our crane as:
Aluminium is lighter
Although aluminium isnt as strong as steel, it is still strong enough for our purposes

Costs:

Aluminium structure = £333.91
Beam Supports = £100 approx
Joints = £55.74
Winch = £21.14
Roller system = £46.98

Total = £557.77 excluding labour costs

Final thoughts of Project

I personally have found this project challenging and interesting as it has increased my knowledge about materials and static mechanics in practical situations.

Throughout this project, the group have not been working well however. 3 out of the 5 of us did the minimum amount of work and i believe at without myself and Will the project would not have been finished on time. I have not enjoyed working with this group and i would not work with any of them except for Will in a group project again.