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| Tilting cab looks good. |
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| At the rear there is plenty of detail. |
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| Cab details are pleasing. |
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| Fine details on the track frames. |
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| Boom sections are plastic - and they look it. The white string does not help the look either. |
Brami - Sennebogen 683 Crawler Crane
Model Review June 2008
Details (continued)
At the rear the counterweight looks impressive as it initially appears to be separate counterweight pieces. In fact it is all one casting. The Sennebogen name is cast into and painted on the lower plates which looks very good as does the red and white hazard markings. Lifting chains are permanently attached to the self-ballasting cylinders, and the detail in this area is all metal. There are also securing chains which model those that are used to retain the counterweight blocks securely together, although in reality they are a little too large in this scale.
Other detail at the rear includes a toolbox and a good fuel filler pipe and cap. The two winches look good although the effect is spoiled by the strange choice of white thread as the rope which just looks wrong.
The boom is a five stage telescope. The lowest section is metal and is good with detail including a cable drum and the main lift cylinder has a hydraulic line detailed on it. The upper boom sections are plastic and unfortunately they look it. The colour match is a little off and they are fairly crudely made and not in keeping with the rest of the model which is a pity. At the boom head the pulleys are brass although the main bank of pulleys is just a single piece. The same is true of the metal hook block.
Features
The tracks are spring loaded and easily removed from the model. In use they are very good indeed rolling very smoothly. The track frames are extendible which means they can be drawn in when the machine is transported and opened up to provide a wider base during lifting.
The cab tilts well although an opportunity has been missed to make the walkway outside the cab foldable for transport. On close inspection this looks like it would have been relatively easy to achieve with careful model design.
The crane rotates and the boom can be raised with the cylinder being stiff enough to hold any angle. The telescope sections pull out in a satisfactory manner without feeling as though they are particularly engineered. The hook can be raised and lowered although it does not lower under its own weight partly due to the lack of free rolling single pulleys in the boom and hook block.
An area of disappointment is the counterweight where, although the detail is great, a little more effort could have produced a removable system . In fact close inspection of the model indicates this could have been easily achieved so presumably it was a deliberate decision not to provide this functionality. At least the lift cylinders can be raised and lowered so this provides some interest.