Your Span. Your Height.
Our Engineering.
When the lift does not fit a standard crane, eme engineers the crane to the lift. Non-standard spans and beam lengths, lift heights and leg geometry, casters for the running surface, and sockets built to the site — on the same 6061-T6 portable aluminum gantry that rolls while fully loaded, from 1,100 to 22,000 lb. Every custom build ships with an engineer-stamped drawing and a Certificate of Test at 125% of rated capacity.
A custom eme gantry crane starts from the catalog, not from a blank sheet. The alloy, the A-frame geometry, the surround-beam trolley, the engineering review and the load test are the same as on every standard unit. What changes is whatever the site needs changed.
Standard beams run 5 to 30 ft depending on the leg set, and the same legs take every length in their range. When the span you need falls between or outside the standard lengths, the beam is cut to the span and ships rated to your capacity class.
How legs, beams and trolleys fit together→Every standard model adjusts in height, which handles most doorway and ceiling limits. An eme gantry can also run with its two legs set to different heights, as long as the top beam is kept level — a step between running surfaces is taken up by the legs' own height adjustment. When the step exceeds the standard adjustment, or the run has to follow a fixed line, eme customizes the leg heights to the environment and validates the leg set as its own structure.
A custom 11000R with one short leg→Phenolic locking casters are standard. Pressure-rated pneumatic casters replace them on roof membranes, finished floors and other surfaces a hard caster would mark, and pneumatic caster bars are available for outdoor work and rougher floors. Each option is matched to the rated capacity of the host gantry.
Caster options→When a lift point does not match a stock socket — an odd-angle mounting face, a non-standard offset, a dock edge, a tank manway, or the outside of a smoke stack at 300 ft — eme engineers a socket to the site geometry and the loads it will see there, including wind at height.
Custom engineered sockets→Site-specific socket brackets, integrated lift fixtures, application-specific trolley adapters and custom beam extensions are engineered to the geometry you send. An engineer-stamped drawing is supplied with every custom unit for owner or structural review before fabrication.
Custom-engineered accessories→A one-off crane gets the same documentation pack as a catalog unit, because the same regulated worksites receive it. The custom 11000R built for the membrane relocation was engineered and documented to the same standards as every other 11000 Series unit. Custom doesn't mean slow: eme turns custom designs around in days, not months.
Every eme gantry is engineered to ASME B30.17. Each design is proof-load qualified on the engineer-stamped drawing before it enters production; the 125% test on your unit is the per-unit production test, documented on its Certificate of Test. Read how a gantry crane is load tested.
Send what you know — a dimensioned sketch, photos of the space, or just the numbers. Engineering works through these six in order and comes back with a configuration, a stamped drawing for review, and a price.
Rated capacity is set by the heaviest lift with margin, not the average. Include the rigging and any below-the-hook device in the number.
The height the hook has to reach at the top of the lift, and the lowest it has to go. This sets the leg length and whether a standard adjustable range already covers it.
The width the beam has to clear between the legs — the equipment, the pit, the trailer. Standard beams run 5 to 30 ft depending on the leg set.
Level concrete, a roof membrane, uneven decks, a fixed track. The surface decides the caster, and whether the crane can roll under load there at all.
The lowest opening and ceiling on the route in, and whether the crane has to pass through assembled or go in as parts.
Indoors or out, confined space, elevation, wind exposure, how often the crane moves between sites. Also what the lift is: a pump pull, a membrane, a rotor, a rain cap.
Both are written up in full as case studies, with the constraint, the configuration and the result the customer reported.
A wastewater plant had to move a 10,000 lb membrane through a confined space bounded by walls of different heights. A catalog gantry has two equal legs and needs a level run. eme engineered an 11000R with one leg considerably shorter than the other, both running on tracks fixed to the concrete deck and the concrete wall — with a separate buckling analysis for the short leg and a revised lateral-stability analysis — so the beam stayed level and the membrane moved without a permanent overhead crane.
Read the membrane case study→A contractor repairing brickwork on 300 ft smoke stacks needed to remove, lower, store and reinstall the rain caps every cycle. eme engineered a socket to mount on the outside of the stack at the top, designed for the wind loading at that height. A 3300CH davit dropped into it, and a standard 4400M gantry handled the staging area at grade. The one-week job ran in four days, and the davit and socket paid for themselves on the first contract.
Read the chimney stack case study→Six capacity classes from 1,100 to 22,000 lb, height adjustment on every standard model, and beam lengths from 5 to 30 ft on the same legs cover most of what comes in as a "custom" request. Start with the portable aluminum gantry crane line and the A-frame lifting device selection guide; if the span, height or site still does not fit, the quote request above is the next step. Running more than one crane? Fleet buyers standardize on leg sets and re-beam to the span instead of buying a new crane.
Load, lift height, clear span, running surface, doorway and headroom limits, and the jobsite. eme engineering responds with a configuration and a stamped drawing for review.
Tell us how to reach you. An eme specialist will follow up within one business day with pricing and availability.
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