Choosing the right tower crane is essential for your construction business. A tower crane is capable of lifting and carrying heavy things, which is something you will not be able to do with just any machine.
While on one hand, you may have a whole bunch of projects ahead of you, and therefore you should be thinking of purchasing one for yourself, there are also companies that have a tight budget or simply don’t have as many projects planned out in a consecutive chain in the future. In that case, hiring a tower crane is the smarter and more cost-effective solution.
Nonetheless, the entire project requires planning and thinking certain things through.
Table of Contents
The environment
For starters, you need to take a good look at the environment that you are going to work in. This way you’ll be able to determine the kind of tower crane that is suitable for the job. Consider how confined the space is going to be, and whether the crane will be able to move in the radius of 360 degrees. It is also quite important that you evaluate the very environment in terms of whether there are any particles of dust or anything else in the air that could have an effect on the crane’s oiling.
How will you be using the crane?
Next, you need to know a bit more about how tower cranes work in order to determine what the best choice is in terms of materials and capacity. When it comes to controlling the very crane, this is something that depends on your operators preferred style as well as needs and requirements.
For example, you can go for a crane that has a top seat station. While this kind of crane will provide you with an overview of the whole construction site, it may also end up being too distant from what needs to be lifted, and therefore be a problem. On the other hand, you have remote-controlled cranes that make it much easier to approach the required area.
Purchase or hire
As we have mentioned in the beginning, sometimes it’s better to purchase a tower crane, while at other times it would be much smarter to hire one. If you know you are going to have a lot of projects in a long-term, you can decide to get a used tower crane for your company to lower the expenses. This, of course, means that you want to make sure that the source has a good reputation. Purchasing a crane that hasn’t been properly serviced and maintained will soon end in a disaster and be a waste of your money.
On the other hand, if you have a limited number of projects in front of you at the moment, and don’t feel that it’s the right time to be purchasing equipment just yet, you should consider tower crane hire. This way you won’t have to go through all the trouble of buying one, shipping it to your location and doing all the maintenance on your own. Another situation when it is smart to hire a crane is when you need a specialty one for a particular project. If it’s something that you will be using just for a single project or two, then there is really no sense in buying it.
In summation
When getting a tower crane for your construction job, it is important to consider whether you will be needing it for an extended period of time or a limited number of projects. If it’s the latter, then you will want to hire a crane instead of spending all that money on purchasing one. Next to that, you must also determine how you will be using the crane, and what kind of environment you are going to be working in.