I want to include a harbor scene on my HO scale layout, and would love to include one or two “modern” cranes in the scene. I’m thinking specifically of the type of crane found nowadays in Baltimore’s (and I’m sure many other US cities) harbor, used to unload cargo from ships along the dock.
I don’t have the skills to design my own model, and haven’t found any commercially available kits. The closest I’ve found is the Walthers pier/travelling crane kit, but it looks (IMHO) like it would fit better in a scene several decades earlier. Does anyone have any pointers to kits of a more modern design?
You mean intermodal? Containers?
I haven’t seen any of those ship to shore cranes, either. They have cranes and carriers for on shore, but not the monsters that unload the ships.
Does anyone know what this is …Intermodal Equipment - KALMAR Container Crane w/Trailer Lifting Arms - Kibri #11752 - new at Walthers in September?
Greg
If you mean the kind of crane used to work container ships, you might want to reconsider. In HO one of them would be about 27 inches high and close to 4 feet long.
Of course, the ship would be ten feet (or more) long. In my case, the one ship and three cranes would take up my entire peninsula, about 60% of my total layout space - and there aren’t even tracks under those cranes (except for the ones they travel on.)
When you start looking at anything involving modern ocean-going ships, the operative adjective is BIG!
Chuck
Chuck has got it right. I wanted to do ore unloading for my steel mill ops till I discovered the ore ship was 72" long and 12" wide. cringe That’s a huge chunk out of your 30" reach real estate.
If you were persistant, you could cut the bridge in half length wise and possibly put up a mirror behind it. But the crane would be static. It’s just an idea, but would save you a lot of space.
Wish I could (quickly) find a picture. If it’s anything like the Walthers version a few years ago, which was basically a giant forklift with a container lifting arm rather than forks, then yes, I’ve actually seen these in operation. Most intermodal yards have traveling cranes that span over the tracks, and they lift containers off and put them parallel to the track, either on the ground or on a chassis (or vice versa). I’ve also seen container lifts that straddle the container, and can stack them 4 high; it’s a very tall machine. The previous Kibri models, which resemble oversize construction site forklifts, I haven’t seen prototypes for, but I’m sure they exist.
I’ve seen the harbor cranes you want in operation. These things are enormous. It would be cool to see an operating scale model, but it would have to be compressed down to a more manageable size, and even then would overwhelm a small to medium size layout. Chuck is correct about tracks not usually being nearby. Sometimes tracks may be in an adjacent or adjoining yard or facility, containers being transferred there by yard trucks. My suggestion would be to use a backdrop with a photo of crane, ship and some stacked containers, and have paved lot run up to the backdrop. The modeled portion should have containers, chassis, and yard trucks as well as a crane to load the trains. I wouldn’t use the “forklift” type container lift/crane, a traveling overhead crane would be more correct for loading trains because they can do it much faster. The forklift type would only be used occasionally in a large yard, such as repositioning containers on chassis, or for maintenance/repair crews, or in a smaller facility where there is less traffic and speed is not as much of an issue