Especially in production safety is capitalised. Efficiency and improvement of costs as well. In many cases a difficult cocktail. But in crane and hoisting technology the combination has been successfully achieved. With their electronic hoist monitoring system NovaMaster, SWF Krantechnik GmbH offers the solution for today’s demands.

NovaMaster can be used together with electric wire rope hoists NOVA by the Mannheim based hoisting specialist. The hoist monitoring system’s innovative technology guarantees a maximum of safety as well as protection of the whole hoist and therefore reduces operating costs.

NovaMaster monitors all relevant lifting gear parameters and ensures an accurate and reliable calculation of current load on hook. At the same time the lifting motor is protected against overload. On top of that the safe working period (SWP) is continuously being calculated. With NovaMaster all relevant lifting gear data can be monitored by users on a display on the push button pendant – either with cable or remote control: Safe working period, total number of starts, total operating time, and average calculated load, SWP of the lifting break and error messages.

Mechanical components and hoisting breaks are protected against wear by NovaMaster’s smooth lifting and stopping of the load. When braking and accelerating, NovaMaster automatically uses the lowest lifting speed, so that the lifting gear brake is relieved. The wear of the gear and linked operating costs are minimised. Cost-intensive stand-still times are reduced due to the longer operating life of the single hoist components.

NovaMaster is a versatile system. Additional relay outputs offer the possibility to attach additional electrically controlled functions. Multi-function inputs for overload switching points or start counter and operating time meter are also included. Especially for the start counter and operating time meter, not only the lifting motor but also the trolley and crane drive motors can be included in the monitoring. An analogue output offers the possibility to connect e.g. a large load display up to10 V. Three different intermediate loads per hoist are programmable. For the use with load carrying devices a slack rope supervision function with bypass is included. It is also possible to link up to 5 hoists by CANbus function.

The load measuring and summation happens optionally by either strain gauge sensor or current motor measurement. As an option, the display can be installed on the control pendant and the load display (± 5%) can then be fitted with tare weight function. The programming of the crane and the monitoring of the current working data is also done on the control pendant. This enables the user to control the crane quickly and easily from the ground.

One of many examples: For the constructional steel producer Yaacobi, the Israeli crane specialist A. Henefeld Metal Works Ltd. designed three overhead cranes in close co-operation with SWF Krantechnik GmbH. The crane was provided as single carrier. One crane is fitted with an electric wire rope hoist NOVA with an ultimate load of 5 tons. The second was especially designed for heavy duty and was fitted with two electric wire rope hoists NOVA with an ultimate load of 3,2 tons each. For the third and most recent crane, two electric wire rope hoists NOVA with an ultimate load of 5 tons were installed. The two hoists are used in tandem processing; which is controlled via linking with NovaMaster. The lifting speeds are 8,0/1,3 m/min and the FEM classification parallels 3m. The overall ultimate load of the crane is 6,3 tons.