French Crane Display Models
Built by Ralph Laughton in October 2009
One of the better sets of recent years was the Special Edition crane set. Not only did it come in a posh case, the model of the crane really works quite well.
The large crane is a French Meccano specially built display model. As you can see, it incorporates many parts finished in non-standard colours. The model is displayed here after considerable refurbishment. We have given all the painted parts a good clean and sorted out the wiring. All of the zinc parts have been replaced and we will re-finish the original parts and replace them at a later date.
The model runs continuously, raising and lowering its load. The orange sprocket wheels and pulleys all rotate now that we have replaced the drive bands, although they have no practical use and just add to the overall effect. The model is a 200% enlargement of the retail set.
The small crane is made from the crane set the big model was made to promote. It is interesting to compare the two models and see how the builders of the display model simply scaled up the smaller model. This sort of promotion is totally different to that of the original dealer display models. This model cannot be built from standard parts as most of the parts were not available at the time and have never been available in these colours. This makes us think that this may have been built for a trade toy fair. We know that there are at least two in existence as the person we brought this one from agreed to sell us the other one in his possession. Both models were rescued from a warehouse clearance — they were in the skip on their way to landfill.