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Showerthought: I quit booming down with the trolley and started walking the load, and my cycle times dropped
For 6 years I ran every pick the same way: brake off, swing the boom, then boom down and drag the load in with the trolley. Last March at a job in Tacoma I watched an old hand named Ray set a 40 foot beam by booming down first and letting the swing bring it home, no trolley travel at all. Tried it on the next 12 picks and every one landed smoother, no drift, no bounce on the block. Ray told me the trolley is for reaching, not for steering, and I have not gone back since. Anyone else get taught to boom down and drag, or was that just my crew's bad habit?
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wood.faith16d ago
Guess Ray never had to set a beam past a wall or drop one behind a column where swinging is a losing game. The trolley exists so you can boom out and boom in without touching the swing, which is the only way to land a load in a tight spot without clipping the headache ball on something. You got lucky that Tacoma job had open air and a clear radius, because on a tilt up or anything with a blind side, letting the swing steer the beam means you are guessing where it lands every time. There is a reason the old hands who ran lattice booms with no trolley loved getting hydros, and it was not so they could park the thing and swing everywhere. Bouncing is a brake and throttle problem, not a trolley problem. Ray just taught you to hide bad boom control behind a smooth arc.
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