Mini Shop Crane

[tmate3]

I started to build this to lift the head off my milling machine, but decided to make a mobil shop crane out of it instead. At 6 1/2 feet, it's short enough and narrow enough to fit through doorways, but tall enough and wide enough to straddle a work bench or cart and lower a load onto it.

Casters each have a 300 lb. capacity, and the comealong 1,000 lbs. (I take that with a grain of salt). I think the framework will take anything the come along can handle.

To store the crane, I put it around a drill press, and they occupy the same space. The drill press can be used with the crane in place, if I'm to lazy to move it. If I wanted to move the drill press, for example, I would lift it enough to put a couple of slats across the bottom two cross braces, and set it down on the slats.

I just ordered a Warn Pullzall to replace the comealong.