What Are the Different Types of Overhead Cranes?

The right material-handling equipment is crucial for solving several challenges in modern distribution and manufacturing facilities. Overhead cranes help get the job done safely, efficiently, and stably. 

What Is an Overhead Crane?

An overhead crane is a machine that hoists and moves heavier materials between destinations in the facility. These pieces of equipment often provide safer and more efficient solutions for transporting items than manual or traditional machine-powered options. 

Benefits of Overhead Cranes in Materials Handling

Overhead cranes offer significant advantages to companies that handle weighty raw materials and finished goods, including:

• Versatility: This equipment is adaptable for numerous industrial applications.
• Safety: These machines contain built-in safety controls and eliminate the injury risks of manually transporting heavy items.
• Productivity: Overhead cranes can move materials quickly and precisely, allowing for more efficiency and a throughput boost.
• Space: Thanks to the overhead operation, this equipment can help your facility optimize its floor space.
• Protection: These assets help reduce the risk of damage to raw materials and goods during transportation within the facility.

Overhead Crane Components

Being familiar with the crane’s components can help you better understand the differences between the types and their design. Common parts and their functions include:

• Hoist: The hoist attaches to the hook and is typically a chain or wire rope that helps secure and lift the products. It can feature manual, pneumatic, or electricity-powered control.
• Runways: These are the traveling paths for the crane as it moves throughout the facility. They support rails or tracks for the bridge.
• Bridge: The bridge is the load-bearing beam joining the crane’s runways and moving the trolley. Layouts include one or two beams called single- or double-girder designs.
• Trolley: This component holds the hoist and is what travels along the crane’s bridge. They can run along the bridge’s bottom surface or on rails mounted to the top.
• End trucks: These parts help move the bridge along the runway with wheels that travel on the runway rails. The crane’s load capacity determines the number of wheels required.
• Bumpers: The bumpers help the crane come to a controlled stop. They can attach to the runway, trolley, or bridge.

Common Applications for Overhead Cranes in Material Handling

Typical applications where overhead cranes drive value include:

• Loading and unloading materials at shipping and receiving docks.
• Moving shipping containers in a storage or transport yard.
• Retrieving raw materials and feeding them into production equipment.
• Moving goods between different production areas.
• Carrying goods down an assembly line.
• Swapping heavy stamping dies into and out of equipment.

What Are the Different Types of Overhead Cranes?

Different overhead crane designs exist to meet unique needs, facility footprints, and company processes. Options vary based on a company’s requirements for performance, load capacity, and other vital factors.

Gantry Cranes

Gantry cranes feature legs supporting the crane’s trolley, hoist, and bridge. This design allows the legs to run on rails affixed to the floor instead of overhead. The approach is most common outdoors, where installing columns and beams is impractical. They’re also useful in facilities with limited overhead clearance for suspended runways.

You’ll find Spanco gantry cranes in steel mills, scrap yards, construction sites, and other facilities.

Workstation Cranes

These models are ideal for moving up to 2 tons of materials within a compact work area. They can be stand-alone or ceiling-mounted solutions and are suitable for repetitive workflows. These options usually offer expansion capability with a modular design and are highly customizable for increased versatility.

Bridge Cranes

Bridge cranes are some of the most common designs in material-handling facilities. They feature two suspended runways connected to a building’s support system. The bridge is one or two steel girders that travel along the runways, while the crane’s trolley and hoist run side-to-side across the bridge. Desired capacity and travel distance determine whether a single- or double-girder is the best choice. The application’s load requirements also help determine whether the hoist and trolley should run along the bridge’s top or bottom.

These cranes come in two general styles — modular and process. 

Modular cranes are the preferred solution for more compact facilities. They typically feature more fundamental designs and fall into the Class C category. Custom engineering can take the crane to Class D if necessary.

Conversely, manufacturers make process cranes to handle more specific needs. These heavy-duty solutions are usually Class D, E, or F and are built for continuous performance while completing repetitive tasks. Most have a double-girder design with top-running trolley wheels and substantial load capacity.

The lineup of high-quality bridge cranes from Spanco is ideal for places like:

• Agricultural equipment and automotive repair shops
• Maintenance plants and distribution centers
• Manufacturing facilities, such as aviation and automotive fabrication

Jib Cranes

Unlike the equipment above, jib cranes have a unique design without tracks or runways. Numerous styles are available, including wall-mounted and stand-alone options. This variety between models provides a wide range of spans, load capacities, and heights. 

The Spanco jib crane selections are ideal for applications where a higher degree of articulation is necessary. These solutions deliver up to 360-degree rotation and generous load capacities in a compact footprint. Your facility saves floor space while enjoying precise maneuverability.

Monorail Cranes

Monorail cranes are common fixtures in production and assembly lines. These machines get their name from their single-path design, where the trolley carries the hoist along one rail. The trolley mounts to the underside of an I-beam, using the beam’s bottom to take materials from one destination to another in a straight line. 

These models are ideal for applications that don’t need the trolley to move side-to-side. They’re available in freestanding and ceiling-mount styles with various lengths and load capacities of up to 2 tons.

Browse Spanco Cranes Online 24/7

Spanco is a premier provider of overhead cranes designed to introduce more safety and higher efficiency to your facility’s material-handling tasks. Our comprehensive product lineup helps companies of various sizes create a setup ideal for their needs and workflows.

Shop our digital showroom around the clock, or contact a Spanco team member with questions.