First let me say sorry for asking a stupid question........Are there ever instances where a wide excavator is transported via girder system trailer? If the excavator doesn't fit on the trailer how do they transport?

In particular the Liebherr R970 SME and a Goldhofer trailer.

Thanks for all your help!

Rocky100370,



Set the I-Beam trailer minus the gooseneck on the ground, arrange blocking/cribbing along side the I-beam trailer for the tracks of the machine to drive on. Drive the machine on the blocking/cribbing over the I-beam. Place blocking/cribbing under the machine on the I-Beam trailer. Connect the gooseneck to the I-beam trailer, lift I-beam trailer to free and remove the blocking/cribbing from under the tracks of the machine. Lower the I-beam trailer to travel height and off you go.

Depending on the transported machine and I-Beam trailers range of height adjustment, sometimes you can skip the blocking/cribbing under the tracks.

Randy

Randy is right on the money. Beam trailers are used when the tracks centers are wider than a trailer deck, to reduce the height, and reduce the empty weight of the trailer. You can save 3,000-5,000 lbs over a deck trailer. They are also used to lift the crane when you have to remove the track carriers, and then transport. With air ride, you can just about put the beam on the ground, allowing you to use a couple outrigger planks to drive the crane over the beam for blocking. Another trick is to put a steel bar or oak block in the sprocket, turn the track and tighten it up. Sometimes you have to chain the track up so it is not hanging too low. Old school turn tables were used to reduce the width on the car body. Two sheets of steel with a center pin. Pull the crane over the beam, lift, remove the track carriers, chain the bottom steel sheet to the beam, chain the car body to the upper sheet, cross chain the house and turn it to turn the car body lenght wise. I have also seen this done with two sheets of plywood with grease in the middle,(pretty dangerous, and needs a good operator). On rubber tire loaders and RT cranes you have to keep the tires above the bottom rail of the beam a few inches, and use caution on humps in the roadway and RR tracks. Tires always gain a few inches when the weight is taken off them. If the tire(s) hit, you might have the machine break the chains, turn on the beam, or blow the drive units. Not a very fun thing to happen. Ken

That's why our drake trailers are so good,
Widen out, walk machine on, tie down go for your life.

Height, weight, width restrictions. Even on major interstates, most overpasses have less than 15 foot clearances.

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regards,
Jim


"Once again, concussion by safety" -Mike Rowe

Well that's just plain stupid.
Must make moving big stuff very hard.

We got that here aswell, here were I live, we can do a 797F on 12 lines of 8(Drake platform) and when you calrose the border into Queensland to do same job, your looking at a minimum of 16 lines of 8.

Thanks Craig. Now that I am retired, all the truck info does't do me any good driving the recliner around the living room.

https://youtu.be/pnEU-wfvV0E

When the axles are expanded out to 10' wide you can haul 60,000 pounds on a tandem set up. I'm not sure what the weight limit is when they're in the standard 8'6" spread.

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Clifton