Crawler plans

Crawlers remain a small part of Multitel Pagliero's overall business - it will make less than 50 this year - but they give the company access to a growing market and allow it to leverage its existing boom designs.

All four of the crawlers made by the company use booms built for its 3.5 t GVW truck mounts, making development relatively easy. The strategy is to marry superstructures from existing truck mounts to standard undercarriages incorporating crawler sets supplied by Palazzani (in return, Palazanni is using Multitel booms on two small crawlers.)

This 'no fuss' modular approach "makes it easier for customers and easier for us in manufacture, service and parts", says Jerry Kist. "We offer an advantage - if a customer or user is familiar with our 3.5 t machines, he will have some benefits in using our crawlers".

With the launch of the SMX250 and SHX190 models the range now spans four machines with working heights of 17 m, 19.5 m, 22.5 m and 25 m. The first Multitel crawler was launched at the 2009 Intermat show.

The SMX250 uses the boom from the MX250 3.5 t truck unit, mounted on the chassis of the existing SMX225 crawler model. The SHX190 crawler, on the other hand, uses the upper-structure of the new hydraulic HX195 truck mount, fitted to the lower body of the SMX170 crawler.

Mr Kist says the booms from the MX270 and MX290 truck mounts may also find themselves used to create two larger crawler units, although a move into even bigger crawler units is not on the cards.