Canopy quickly erected

The job was tailor-made for the Liebherr MK 88-4.1E. Thanks to its ability to be positioned in the immediate vicinity of the buildings, the mobile construction crane was able to lift around half of the nearly 20 elements of the protective roof from the newly renovated building and position them directly onto the neighbouring block of flats. The aluminium segments, which were up to 20 metres long and some of which were still covered with fabric, weighed around one tonne. “The direct transfer from one roof to the next saved us a lot of time,” says crane operator Henri Haandrikman. Some segments had to be temporarily stored on the lawn at first. However, once the crane had been moved to its next position, they could be quickly picked up and placed on the target roof. By the evening, the extensive job was complete.

The major advantage of the MK 88-4.1E was already evident when choosing the set-up location: trees and obstructions made the use of a conventional mobile crane in the same load-bearing class practically impossible. Haandrikman was able to set up his crane directly next to the scaffolding of the renovated building and reach all the segments for dismantling from there. “A conventional mobile crane would have had to be set up on the road some distance away and would have been correspondingly much larger,” explains the crane operator, who is originally from the Netherlands.

Long reach despite the boom’s steep angle

Even the required hook height of around 30 metres posed no problem for the compact mobile construction crane. With the jib angled at 15 degrees, the crane positioned the white protective canopies precisely onto the prepared scaffolding of the target building. “The 15-degree angle is simply perfect for this job,” said Haandrikman, who has been working with mobile and mobile construction cranes for over 20 years. “This jib position reduces the reach only minimally, but gives me an extra ten metres of lifting height at the end of the jib. And the continuously height-adjustable driver’s cab is particularly practical: for installation work like this, precise manoeuvring is no problem because I have a direct line of sight to the load and to the fitters on the roof.”

In addition to the variable ballast system, Haandrikman cites the MK 88-4.1E’s electric mode as a further advantage, as it enables quiet operation on the building site. “I also find the extensive lighting system very beneficial. We rely on it particularly during the long Swedish winter, and it allows us to significantly extend our operating hours.”

The experienced crane operator and his MK 88-4.1E are not only in action in the greater Uppsala area; the Dutchman is also on the move with his silver-blue Liebherr mobile construction crane in Enköping and in the capital, Stockholm. “We do a lot of work in concrete construction. There, I install formwork and reinforcing steel or have concrete buckets on the hook. The crane is also frequently used in steel construction and for erecting prefabricated timber houses, which can be built particularly quickly with an MK crane.” For Pontáns Kranar, the MK 88-4.1E is therefore a versatile crane – particularly where long reaches and quick repositioning are required despite limited space.