Trailer Cranes
Maximise your vehicle’s payload with a trailer crane from Penny Engineering – easy to operate and compatible with most trailer brands. We’ll help you specify the perfect crane, trailer, and tow combination, enhancing the efficiency and safety of all your material handling operations.
Our Crane for Trailer Range
Why Use a Trailer with Crane Functionality?
Avoid Accidents
Together, a reliable crane and trailer can eliminate the need for heavy lifting across your operations, protecting your staff from injury and safeguarding your assets from damage.
Versatile Handling
Our trailer crane range opens your business to new possibilities, able to lift and position heavy loads of up to 1800kg. Fully configurable, they address your unique operational demands.
Improve Productivity
A trailer crane does all the heavy lifting for you, expanding material handling capabilities and reducing group tasks to a single operator – boosting efficiency, productivity, and revenue.
Maximise Payload
Our trailer cranes are strong yet lightweight. Requiring little space to operate and built to last the test of time, they minimise environmental impact and maximise your payload capacity.
International Partners
Penny Engineering supplies lifting equipment to over 25 countries around the world. Click through to find out more.
What Is a Trailer Crane and How Do You Choose One?
When a vehicle needs to carry its full payload, a trailer crane can be an excellent alternative. However, trailers aren’t typically designed to accommodate cranes, and their lightweight nature means they offer significantly less stability than vehicles. Fortunately, equipping a trailer with crane functionality is still possible, and crucially, with Penny Engineering, it’s safe.
To specify your trailer crane, we must first identify the lightest crane capable of achieving your maximum lifting and reach parameters. Next, we will make sure that the selected trailer can handle the combined weight of the crane and the cargo. Then, we must verify that the tow vehicle and the tow bar can reliably and legally manage the total weight of the laden trailer.
There are many factors to consider when choosing a trailer crane, but we’re here to help – ensuring you drive away with a product that’s reliable, safe, and compliant. The guide below covers all the key considerations in detail, including the limitations of fitting cranes to trailers and the information we need from you to specify the right crane for your requirements.
Trailer Crane Guide
Why Choose Penny Engineering for Your Trailer Crane?
At Penny Engineering, all our products are custom-made in our state-of-the-art facility based in the heart of the UK. This in-house production allows us to tailor solutions to your specific operational needs, employing agility in our processes and delivering the highest quality with unrivalled lead times.
We’re proud to offer a comprehensive service for our customers, designing and installing solutions for both customer-selected trailers and those sourced directly by our team. With safety at the forefront of everything we do, we rigorously test each trailer crane conversion before handover and guarantee that no unfit or untested trailer crane will leave our yard.
Just as choosing the right product for your business is important, so is its maintenance. We offer comprehensive servicing contracts to help you understand your obligations and keep your cranes in full working order. As the manufacturer of your trailer crane, we possess the knowledge and expertise to ensure your equipment remains safe, operational, and compliant.
Accreditations
Sectors We Work With
Trailer Crane FAQs
A Penny Engineering trailer crane has an expected lead time of 5-6 weeks from placing the order.
In short, no. The suitability of a trailer crane depends greatly on the trailer’s stability, strength, carrying capacity payload, axle loadings, and the towing vehicle.
To specify any crane for trailer use, we need to ensure the right combination of crane, trailer, and tow. Please consider the following:
The Load
- What are you lifting, and how heavy is it?
- What are the physical dimensions of the load?
- How far from the base of the crane will the load be lifted?
- How often will you need to lift the load?
The Crane
- How do you intend to power the crane?
- Where would you prefer the crane to fit on the trailer?
- Where will you operate the crane from?
The Trailer
- What is the make and model of the trailer?
- What are the physical dimensions of the trailer, including the centre of gravity?
- How many axles does the trailer have?
- What is the trailer’s empty weight and maximum load capacity?
- What is the trailer’s nose weight and maximum permissible nose weight?
- What is the trailer’s hitch height?
- Does the trailer have drop-down legs to support the front / rear when being loaded?
The Tow Vehicle
- Will the trailer have a regular tow vehicle and if so, what make and model?
- What is the tow ball height?
- What is the maximum load capacity of the vehicle / tow ball?
- What is the maximum permissible overall combined mass of the vehicle and trailer?
You can find out more about what information we need from you to specify a crane and trailer in our full guide.
HIAB is a well-known brand that specialises in manufacturing vehicle-mounted cranes. While their offering does include a HIAB trailer solution, these are large trailers fixed to large vehicles – not separate trailers towed by regular vehicles.
At Penny Engineering, our cranes can be mounted to both vehicles and individual trailers towed by vehicles. We can specify small trailer cranes for loads weighing from 150kg, as well as heavy-duty trailer cranes for loads weighing up to 1800kg.
We offer a complete service, including unlimited customisation, rapid lead times, warranty packages, proactive servicing and maintenance, and comprehensive post-sales support – helping minimise downtime, costs, and inconvenience for our customers.
BS 7121-1 is the UK standard for those planning and carrying out lifting operations with cranes. It also provides recommendations for the safe use of any cranes permanently or temporarily installed in a work environment.
For lifting operations, BS 7121-1 covers:
- Safe systems of work selection
- Erection & dismantling
- Maintenance
- Inspection
- Thorough examination
- Operation
- Planning & management
Additionally, BS 7121-1 offers guidance on complying with the requirements of LOLER and PUWER, which is a legal requirement for any owner or manager of lifting equipment / operations in the workplace.
BS 7121-1 is also used by the Health and Safety Executive as an indication of good practice.
If you need help specifying a crane for trailer use, please contact your area manager or call our sales office on 01246 811 475. Alternatively, you can use our configurator for a recommendation based on your inputted requirements.