Crane (railroad)

A rail crane is a crane that is pivotally mounted on a railway vehicle.

It is mainly used for salvaging derailed rail vehicles, the bridge over railway lines and in new construction and repair of rails. Here, the work train is often used on a track parallel to the construction site. For conventional construction sites that are not connected to the rail network, he usually has no meaning. In the area of the Deutsche Reichsbahn (DR ) of the GDR, he was also called EDK ( railway crane ).

The first rail cranes were built with hand-operated winches on flat cars. From 1860 there were steam-powered cranes, developed by the British firm Appleby Brothers. In Germany, the first railway steam cranes were made ​​until thirty years later. After 1900 cranes were also built so that they could be set in normal trains, making transportation easier. The diesel drive was tried in 1930, but still lacked powerful diesel engines. It was not until 1960, in Germany diesel hydraulic cranes as standard. At Deutsche Reichsbahn in the GDR there were diesel-electric driven cranes. From 1960, also hydraulic telescopic boom came instead of conventional moving with ropes boom for execution. Today ( 2012) are only built such a boom.

Known manufacturers of railway cranes were Kirov Leipzig, Krupp Ardelt, SMS Demag and Gottwald KG Leo. Today, these companies only Kirov active in this area. Gottwald has now ceased production.