Railway Breakdown Crane
Built by David Smithers in January 2016
Another Meccano manual model which, with a few (!) extra parts makes a really attractive model.
The most obvious improvements are full bracing on the jib, 1” pulleys for the luffing and hoist movements and simple stabilisers to prevent it falling over when lifting a load at the side. Less obviously, all the wheels are 1¼" flanged wheels, the turntable has ball bearings and there is counter-weighting on the trolley and at the read of the cab.
I deliberately made the model essentially as described in the instruction manual, just modifying things as I went along. Clearly if starting from scratch with an unlimited selection of parts there are many more improvements which could be made.