The 9320s used a fabricated carbody as opposed to a cast carbody as used on the smaller 900s. Hence I would concurr that these are likely 9310s. There were 200 some 9310s built. The classic American colors were the yellow with black boom and carbody. Counterweights were sometimes yellow and sometimes black. Later, the black and white stripe was added. At that point the model number was placed in the stripe as opposed to in the American shield. Only at the very end under Terex did the white come into play.

The carriers on the earlier Americans were not built by American and hence varried by their manufacturer. They were supplied by Hendrickson, Crane Carrier and Pierce Pacific. In the early 70's American began building their own. Look for the model number in the grill of the carrier on the American built carriers. At the end some private carriers were again used. For instance the Maxim 9490 is on a Pierce Pacific carrier. This may have been due to size but also when American was broken up, the carrier plant was sold separately from the crane manufacturing. Note the successor to this plant, Tor, builds the carriers for the Manitowoc 2250T I believe. I am not sure of the relationship with Consolidated in Canada but their design closely parallels that of the Americans.

The other thing that happened was the existence of parallel 9400 and 9500 models in the truck cranes. The first 9510 built for McHugh had a Hendrickson carrier. These had the short high profile carriers. As things progressed the 9500s used the longer low profile carrier and the 9400s the short high carrier. This was unique to the 900 series. The 800 series truck machines used the American built carrier but had a house unique to the series and was not built as a crawler. The later small crawler used a different style operators cab spliced into the original house design that has square lines and a reverse slant window at the operators feet. Likewise, you will find some crawlers that were later placed on truck carriers and the reverse.

Hence I thoroughly understand Northwest's comment that they seem as if they were all customs. They just had more variants than their competitors. The McHugh 175 and 200 ton machines were on Hendrickson carriers. I've seen their larger machines and one was on the low profile American carrier. Some materials say McHugh had a 265 ton crawler and a 300 ton truck machine. If this is correct, they were specials or prototypes. The 300 was offered as a truck machine but I believe that Maxim in Pheonix may have the only one built when announced as a production offering. Likewise the 265 ton McHugh crawler had a counterweight stack more similar to the later 250 ton 9320 but with the cast carbody. I've often wondered if this was a misprint as the 165 ton 9299 was the big crawler at the time it appeared. There may have been more unique machines than we are aware of and back when some of these machines existed tipping was the critical factor as they were so stoutly built that one did not exceed their structural ratings.

Sorry to disapoint people but after talking to Jimmy McHugh today the biggest crawler they owned was a 9310 and the largest truck was a 220 ton American . For heavy lifts they had a American Guy Derrick attachment . They had a 1100 series on rent for a year at a power house job but did not purchase it . They did have long booms and jibs on the rigs up to 600 ft .The heavy haul fleet had 2 250 ton Talbert Low Beds and a 150 ton beam along with a Trabosa Dolly system and 2 Cline Detroit powered tractors . Normal tractors were Autocars , Hendricksons and Fords all Detroit powered , thet even had a D-6 Cat dozer with a 6-71 N in it . The heavy boom tip was theirs and all NY , NJ, & Pa guys had cheater booms at 99 ft to avoid long boom rate !!! John

Maxium's 9490

that 9490 looks nice, i havent seen any of maxims lattice truck cranes yet, great pics justin

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Brandon

my youtube channel
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Here are some otherpics of these Americans on this site

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NIkl Scale Models

Thanks for all your pictures, i will contribute by my side as i am happy to talk about a big US name in cranes

here is a picture of what is in my opinion the most powerful and most beautiful RINGER crane:
this 9320 with its complete ringer attachment is a real beast!

[quote=eef7260]Hi northwest

Are you already working on your 1:10 scale American ??? and if so please share some pics with us.
I think you will like this piture anyway

Regards Eef

Another great American post on DHS thanks to Plumber for starting this one .

Hi EEF! yes i'am already working on my 1/10 th American 9320, i solved many problems but i am actually blocked at the level of "mini brakes" and "mini clutch " designs, really complicated at this scale, i want to reproduce something really accurate with true dragline functions, my goal is to make a 9320 with a cutter tool like the one used by Spie Fondations, the company where i work actually.
What is a cutter, here is a picture of one we sent in Dubai


I know that you EEF you built a wonderful 7260, wich HONESTLY inspirated me some years ago!! thank you again ! I know that you are a specialist in American crane, and i share this with you, i don't know exactly but i really love the American design, these are the best cranes for me, i have access to an enormous stock of photos of my actually job company, which used a wide fleet of american 900 series for foundations works, and i even found a photo of a big 11250 working for a strange 70's foundations work for a military project in Iraq , i will try to scan the old photo and show you this beautiful beast...
For you EEF, here are some pics of a very rare 7300 used until last year here in France:very close to a 7260 which is also one of my favorite American 700 series:

with the White Spie fondations colour (late 90's)



and with the original American paint scheme late 80's:





every photos showing a 9320 american or a 900 series with ringer attachment is welcome for my project

to end my comments, tell me what you think:

i was tempted to convert in the future, once it is fully assembled, my 9320 as an hydraulic HOE:



i finally abandoned this project and kept my original second machine on what i 'am focusing for 1/10 scale:



the house cab design of American would have give something really interesting in a Hoe configuration, but the crawler frame of a crane is not suitable for Hoe applications.
The only exception and the best US example is still the 100 DH northwest "convertible" as an incredible 1200-C crane.

Hi northwest

First of all thanks for these pics , always great to see new ones.
Really looking forward to see more from your archive got some unique pics there .
I have got an feeling that i know this 7300 and i know where it came from.
Same machine ??? this one was sold from Holland to France somewhere in the 80's.

( p.s. I would keep my 9320 original , i really like the hoe id but nothing can beat a 9320 as a scalemodel , just my thoughts )

Regards Eef





And some pics to think about

( next 2 pics are not mine found them somewhere on the net so credits to original owner )

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***Flickr American cranes group***3D printed crane parts at I.materialise

And some pics from Americans that not everybody knows about.

First one is the 1400 steel erector , not many where made but i don't know how many.

Than the 1500 that only made it to the drawing board as far as i know.

And a 500 serie truck crane made in korea onder licence.

enjoy these special pics.

Eef

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***Flickr American cranes group***3D printed crane parts at I.materialise