118 — The Crane toolbar

The ConstructiVision Crane toolbar is where you choose the crane for a job and read panels against its load chart. It has seven buttons. Three set up and look up the machine. Three work from one crane position that you type: draw the crane there, score one pick from it, or score every panel from it. The last, Plan Picks, plans every pick on the site.

Every verdict these buttons print compares a panel’s weight with the chosen machine’s load chart at a radius. That is a planning check. It is not a lift plan, and it does not replace the crane supplier’s chart or the people who sign off the lift.

Warning

Crane stations and the slab edge — read this before copying any station shown here.

A crane station must sit entirely outside the wall-clearance standoff, on prepared subgrade, or entirely inboard of the closure strip, on the poured slab. Never between the two, and never spanning the boundary. The test is the machine’s bearing footprint — its tracks or outriggers — not the centre of a drawn circle. One track on poured slab and one on unpoured subgrade gives differential support under the mat; the slab edge spalls or the subgrade settles, and the machine goes out of level under load.

TCA Safety Guideline v13.1 (June 2013) §2 item 6, p.8: “Install entrance and exit ramps for the crane to position itself onto the floor slab. Do not allow the crane to exert its weight on the extreme edge of any portion of the slab.” See also OSHA 29 CFR 1926.1402 — ground conditions; the operator must be notified of bearing capacity, and the controlling entity is responsible for adequate site preparation.

Check every station yourself. Draw Crane, Crane Pick and Crane Capacity Check put the crane exactly where you type it and do not test the slab edge. Plan Picks scores its stations against the drawn slab and refuses a site that has none. Do not copy a crane position from this lesson, or from its video, onto a real site. Have the setup reviewed against the machine’s bearing footprint and the site’s own closure-strip and brace-line dimensions.

Note

Draw Crane, Crane Pick and Crane Capacity Check put the crane exactly where you type it. In the runs this lesson is built from, their command-line reports said nothing about the slab edge, the closure strip or the wall clearance. Every crane centre quoted on this page was typed for the exercise. None of them is a sited station.

Where it is

The ConstructiVision Crane toolbar is the third toolbar row, under ConstructiVision and ConstructiVision Site & Tools. Its seven buttons sit in three groups, in this order:

group	button	command you can type
the machine	Crane Configuration	CV-CRANE-CONFIG
	Crane Catalog	CV-CRANE-LIST
	Crane Weight Units	CV-CRANE-UNITS
one crane position	Draw Crane	CV-CRANE
	Crane Pick	CV-CRANE-PICK
	Crane Capacity Check	CV-CRANE-CHECK
the whole site	Plan Picks	CV-PICK-PLACE

Hover a button for its tooltip. Each section below starts with it.

Work in a site drawing with its panel drawings in the same folder. The examples use the ConstructiVision Sample Building site, CSBsite1.dwg, with its 59 panels. Plan Picks uses the Arlington Airport A site, AAAsite1.dwg, with its panel drawings beside it.

Two buttons need something drawn first:

• Crane Capacity Check needs the cast record that Cast Layout Draw or Construction Layout stores in the drawing. Both are on the ConstructiVision Site & Tools toolbar.

• Plan Picks needs a drawn slab. Its tooltip also says to run it after Construction Layout.

The machine and weight units you choose are kept. On the seat, a fresh AutoCAD session opened Crane Configuration with the machine and units chosen in the session before.

1 Crane Configuration

Tooltip: “Pick the crane MACHINE and the weight display units. Sets the machine every capacity verdict scores against – rings, pick verdicts, the batch check and the sequence. Warns if drawn geometry still describes the previous machine.”

Try it on CSBsite1

1. Click Crane Configuration. The dialog ConstructiVision - Crane Configuration opens.

2. Read the list. Its columns are Machine, Cap, Class, Boom, MaxBoom and Chart. Under the list, the current machine is shown: Current: Liebherr LR 1300  --  verified published load chart.

3. Select Liebherr LR 1300 (300t  crawler  lattice  322ft  VERIFIED).

4. Under Weight units, choose Tonnes. The other two choices are Short tons and Kips.

5. Click OK.

What you see

[CRANE] machine = lr1300 -- capacity rings, pick verdicts and the batch check now score against it.
[CRANE] weights read in  t -- charts are published in metric tonnes and are converted for display only.

• Cancel leaves everything as it was: [CRANE] configuration unchanged.

• A machine whose chart is not a verified published chart is marked APPROX in the Chart column. Choosing one (Liebherr LR 1400/2 on this site) adds: [CRANE] NOTE: this machine's load chart is REPRESENTATIVE, not published -- capacity verdicts for it are approximate.

• If a crane for the old machine is already drawn, you are told. On CSBsite1, with an LTM 1500-8.1 crane drawn and Liebherr LR 11000 chosen: [CRANE] ** the crane CV-CRANE drew (226 entities) still shows ltm1500 -- run CV-CRANE to draw lr11000 in its place.

2 Crane Catalog

Tooltip: “List every machine in the crane catalog with capacity and whether each load chart is VERIFIED or only representative. Prints to the command line; changes nothing”

Try it

1. Click Crane Catalog. Nothing opens. The list prints at the command line.

This run was on the Arlington site drawing, AAAsite1. The list is the product’s crane catalog, not something stored in the drawing.

What you see

[CRANE] catalog:
  lr1160  Liebherr LR 1160  160t  chart VERIFIED
  lr1250  Liebherr LR 1250  250t  chart representative
  lr1300  Liebherr LR 1300  300t  chart VERIFIED
  lr1400  Liebherr LR 1400/2  400t  chart representative
  lr1600  Liebherr LR 1600/2  600t  chart VERIFIED
  mlc100  Manitowoc MLC100-1  100t  chart VERIFIED
  mlc300  Manitowoc MLC300  300t  chart representative
  mlc650  Manitowoc MLC650  650t  chart VERIFIED
  lr1800  Liebherr LR 1800-1.0  800t  chart VERIFIED
  lr11000  Liebherr LR 11000  1000t  chart VERIFIED
  cc38650  Tadano CC 38.650-1  650t  chart VERIFIED
  ck2750  Kobelco CK2750G-2  249t  chart representative
  ck1600  Kobelco CK1600G-2  145t  chart representative
  lb348  Link-Belt 348 Series 2  272t  chart representative
  gmk5250l  Grove GMK5250L  250t  chart representative
  gmk6300l  Grove GMK6300L  300t  chart representative
  gmk6400  Grove GMK6400  400t  chart representative
  ltm1250  Liebherr LTM 1250-5.1  250t  chart VERIFIED
  ltm1300  Liebherr LTM 1300-6.2  300t  chart VERIFIED
  ltm1500  Liebherr LTM 1500-8.1  500t  chart VERIFIED
  ac300  Demag AC 300-6  300t  chart representative
  ac500  Demag AC 500-8  500t  chart representative
  atf400  Tadano ATF 400G-6  400t  chart representative
  ac650  Demag AC 650  750t  chart representative

Twenty-four machines. The first column is the short name you type at Draw Crane’s Machine prompt (section 4 types lr1160).

The catalog says representative where Crane Configuration’s Chart column says APPROX. On every row the two can be compared, they mark the same machines.

3 Crane Weight Units

Tooltip: “Switch the weight DISPLAY between tonnes, short tons and kips. Display only – the capacity math stays in metric tonnes and the drawing is untouched”

Try it

1. Click Crane Weight Units. It asks at the command line: Weight units [Tonnes/Short tons/Kips] <Tonnes>:

2. Answer with one of the three units.

What a kips display looks like

The same three choices are the Weight units group in Crane Configuration. With Kips chosen there, and Liebherr LR 1160 as the machine, Crane Pick on CSBsite1 printed CSB001’s weight and the verdict in kips:

[PICK] CSB001: 283.0w x 324.5h x 7.25t in -> 52.76  kip  (from its NOD)
[PICK] OVER-CAPACITY  radius 125.2ft  load 52.8 kip  cap 19.4 kip  margin -33.4 kip  [net of hook block 2.3 t; rigging NOT deducted (no allowance set)]

The same panel reads 23.93  t in tonnes. The hook-block note stays in tonnes either way.

4 Draw Crane

Tooltip: “Draw one crane at a picked point. Prompts for the centre and the machine. Replaces whatever is on the CV-CRANE layer, and selecting a machine here also sets it for every capacity verdict”

Try it on CSBsite1

This run started with Liebherr LR 1300 chosen and the casting yard drawn by Cast Layout Draw.

1. Click Draw Crane.

2. At Crane centre: type the point. The run typed -5000,-5000.

3. At Machine <Liebherr LR 1300>: press Enter to keep the machine in the brackets, or type a short name from the Crane Catalog. The run typed lr1160.

4. Because the casting yard was drawn for a different machine, it asks: Re-run the casting-yard draw now? This re-packs the yard. [Yes/No] <Yes>: The run answered Yes.

What you see

[CRANE] boundary ring at reach 64ft + 3 capacity band(s) 14m 16m 18m -- 20 chart ring(s) omitted (beyond reach, or trimmed for legibility).
[CRANE] Liebherr LR 1160 -- boom 129ft, reach 64ft, tip 122ft.
[CRANE] ** drawn geometry still describes lr1300, not lr1160:
[CRANE] **   223 casting-yard entities -- ring RADII and labels, and the PANEL COLOURS, which are the feasibility signal, not decoration. A panel shown as a feasible pick may not be one for lr1160.
Re-run the casting-yard draw now? This re-packs the yard. [Yes/No] <Yes>: Yes

After Yes, the old yard is cleared and drawn again for the new machine:

[CAST] cleared the previous casting yard (223 entities) before drawing this one
[CAST] 59 panels (16 staged interior); 1444 t; crane LR1160 @ (1865,-1626).

• The yard still has 59 panel outlines, not 118: the old ones were removed.

• With LR 1300 the 59 outlines were 51 red and 8 yellow. Redrawn for LR 1160, all 59 are red.

• The machine you typed at the Machine prompt is now the machine for every verdict: the cast summary now reads crane LR1160.

• The crane goes on layer CV-CRANE. Its reach is drawn as a ring with three capacity bands inside it, as the first line says. For the LR 1300, the reach ring is a dashed circle labelled MAX REACH 71ft (22m).

Set the machine back to Liebherr LR 1300 in Crane Configuration before the next two sections.

5 Crane Pick

Tooltip: “Score ONE pick: prompts for the crane centre, then select a panel. Reads that panel’s own NOD for size and mass, draws the crane luffed and slewed to it, and prints the verdict. Refuses rather than inventing numbers for a non-panel”

Try it on CSBsite1

Liebherr LR 1300 and Tonnes are chosen in Crane Configuration.

1. Zoom in on panel CSB001 first, so your click lands on the panel and not on the wall line under it.

2. Click Crane Pick.

3. At Crane centre: type 3717.5,-2558.25.

4. At Select the panel to pick: click panel CSB001. (The run typed the point 3717.5,-3726.0, on the panel’s face.)

What you see

[PICK] CSB001: 283.0w x 324.5h x 7.25t in -> 23.93  t  (from its NOD)
[CRANE] boundary ring at reach 99ft + 3 capacity band(s) 22m 24m 26m -- 12 chart ring(s) omitted (beyond reach, or trimmed for legibility).
[PICK] OK  radius 98.6ft  load 23.9 t  cap 33.0 t  margin 9.1 t  [net of hook block 5.5 t; rigging NOT deducted (no allowance set)]

• No typed weight. CSB001’s width (283.0 in), height (324.5 in) and thickness (7.25 in) are read from the panel itself and give 23.93 t.

• At 98.6 ft the LR 1300 chart gives 33.0 t, after the 5.5 t hook block is taken off. The panel is 23.9 t, so the margin is 9.1 t and the verdict is OK.

• The machine decides the verdict. The same pick from the same centre with Liebherr LR 1160 chosen: [PICK] OVER-CAPACITY  radius 98.6ft  load 23.9 t  cap 13.2 t  margin -10.7 t  [net of hook block 2.3 t; rigging NOT deducted (no allowance set)]

• The crane is drawn at the centre you typed. Choosing another machine afterwards warns that the drawn crane still shows the old one (section 1).

Click something that is not a panel and it refuses. With the drawing zoomed out, the click landed on the wall line under CSB001:

[PICK] that is a LINE, not a panel insert.
[PICK] cancelled.

No verdict is printed.

6 Crane Capacity Check

Tooltip: “Score EVERY panel against one crane position and report only the refusals. Needs the cast record that Cast Draw or Construction Layout stores in the drawing, so run one of them first. Report only – draws nothing”

Try it on CSBsite1

Liebherr LR 1300 is chosen in Crane Configuration.

1. On the ConstructiVision Site & Tools toolbar, click Cast Layout Draw. The sheet title reads CONSTRUCTION LAYOUT (cast-IN)  59 panels  1444 t  pick 1-59  crane LR1300  (16 staged interior), with RED RING = UNSAFE BEYOND 26m (85ft) -- heaviest panel P18 33.4t above it. The cast record is stored in the drawing. No file is written beside it.

2. Click Crane Capacity Check.

3. At Crane centre: type 1924,-1930.38. That is the middle of the building’s wall-line extents on this site.

It does not ask for a machine. It uses the one chosen in Crane Configuration.

What you see

The report names the machine and chart, lists every panel it refuses, and ends with a count. Here is the start and the end of it:

[CHECK] lr1300 (published chart)
  P59  NO   governed at SET -- NO-BOOM-SOLUTION  cast r=80ft  set r=162ft  load 18.6 t  cap 14.0 t  [net of hook block 5.5 t; rigging NOT deducted (no allowance set)]
  P58  NO   governed at SET -- NO-BOOM-SOLUTION  cast r=81ft  set r=161ft  load 18.6 t  cap 14.0 t  [net of hook block 5.5 t; rigging NOT deducted (no allowance set)]
  ...
  P37  NO   governed at SET -- OVER-CAPACITY  cast r=108ft  set r=106ft  load 24.9 t  cap 24.5 t  [net of hook block 5.5 t; rigging NOT deducted (no allowance set)]
  P35  NO   governed at CAST -- OVER-CAPACITY  cast r=132ft  set r=124ft  load 31.1 t  cap 18.5 t  [net of hook block 5.5 t; rigging NOT deducted (no allowance set)]
  ...
  P1  NO   governed at CAST -- NO-BOOM-SOLUTION  cast r=196ft  set r=220ft  load 23.9 t  cap 0.0 t  [net of hook block 5.5 t; rigging NOT deducted (no allowance set)]
[CHECK] 3 feasible, 56 refused, of 59 panels.

• Each refused panel is listed by its pick number from the cast layout (P1 to P59).

• cast r is the radius to the panel where it lies cast. set r is the radius to where it is set. governed at CAST or governed at SET names which of the two the refusal comes from.

• From this one centre: 56 refused, 3 feasible. Of the 56, 51 are NO-BOOM-SOLUTION and 5 are OVER-CAPACITY; 22 are governed at CAST and 34 at SET.

• Feasible panels are not listed. The three missing from the list, P31, P36 and P38, are the feasible ones.

• It draws nothing and changes nothing. The drawing looked the same before and after, and the stored cast record was the same after the check as before it.

From this one centre, 3 of the 59 panels pass. The check scores one crane position at a time, so each centre you try is a separate run, and each one is still yours to site against the slab edge and the closure strip.

7 Plan Picks

Tooltip: “Plan every pick in mark order after Construction Layout: each crane station wholly on the slab or beyond the wall clearance, never straddling the slab edge; tail swing clear of standing panels and braces; pick and set radius inside the load chart. Unsafe picks show in red for you to show or skip. Refuses on a site with no drawn slab”

Try it on AAAsite1

1. Open AAAsite1.dwg in its project folder, with its panel drawings beside it.

2. Click Plan Picks. It asks first whether to run the QA check:

   [PICK-PLACE] No QA check has been run on this drawing. CV-INTERFERE finds layout errors in minutes; a pick simulation can take hours, and a fix afterwards means running it again. Run QA first? [Run/Proceed] <Run>:

   The QA check is Interference Check on the ConstructiVision Site & Tools toolbar.

3. The run typed Proceed.

What you see

[PICK-PLACE] QA skipped by the user -- planning without it.
[PICK-PLACE] carry: a panel's bottom rides 2.0 ft off the slab through the swing, 2 ft over the tallest panel lying on the deck
[CSV-WARN] No tilt_list found in drawing NOD
[PICK-PLACE] REFUSED: no slab ring -- nothing to score a crane station against.

AAAsite1 has no drawn slab ring, so there is no slab edge to score a station against. Plan Picks stops there and places nothing. This is the refusal the tooltip describes: “Refuses on a site with no drawn slab”.

Reading the result

The pick and check lines use the same words:

in the line	what it is
radius	distance from the crane centre to the panel, in feet
load	the panel’s weight, from the panel’s own data
cap	the chart capacity at that radius, after the hook block is taken off
margin	cap minus load; negative when the verdict is OVER-CAPACITY
net of hook block 5.5 t	the hook block the chart deduction used. It follows the machine: 5.5 t for the LR 1300, 2.3 t for the LR 1160, 6.1 t for the LTM 1500-8.1, 11.0 t for the LR 11000
rigging NOT deducted (no allowance set)	rigging weight is not taken off the capacity
OK, OVER-CAPACITY, NO-BOOM-SOLUTION	the three verdicts printed in these runs

Watch for this line on a machine marked representative. With Liebherr LR 1400/2 chosen, Crane Pick on CSBsite1 ended its verdict with [chart NOT modelled for this machine -- scored against LR1300]. The verdict was worked out against the LR 1300’s chart, not the machine you chose.

What this lesson does not cover

• Siting the crane. Nothing on this page is a crane position to copy. See the warning at the top.

• Rigging. The verdicts say rigging is not deducted. How to set a rigging allowance is not covered.

• The crane sequence and run commands. Crane Sequence, Run One Pick, Run All Picks and the other sequence commands are not on this toolbar and are not taught here.

• A finished Plan Picks plan. This lesson shows only the refusal on a site with no drawn slab.

• Lift engineering. The verdicts compare weight with a load chart. They are not a lift plan.

Watch the lesson

A companion video for this lesson is planned alongside the written curriculum.