Knuckleboom Crane

Introduction The goal of this project was to design a knuckleboom crane for arctic and marine conditions. Cold and harsh conditions such as these provide challenges like increased corrosion, extra loads due to waves and wind, ice, and much more. The project was done in collaboration with Michael Mayer, Stian Pedersen, Matthias Schranz as a semester project in mechatronics at the University of Agder. Concept Generation A lot of concepts were generated based on the design brief. Customer needs and existing products were the basis for a list of selection criteria, which was then used to select the best concept. Concept sketches were also made for each sub-system of the crane such as the type of extension mechanism in the jib, fixture, slewing mechanism, joint type, and de-icing methods. These were evaluated against their own set of selection criteria. The best solutions for each sub-system were incorporated into the main concept. Finite Element Analysis The strength of the crane is analyzed according to DNV's standard for marine lifting equipment No. 2.22 Load case III which takes into account wind, nominal load, acceleration of the vessel, and more. Results The resulting crane has a total horizontal reach of 12.4 m, lift capacity of 1240 kg, and is made to be as small as possible in the folded state.