Link-Belt Cranes

Link-Belt Cranes is an American industrial company that develops and manufactures heavy construction equipment, specializing in telescopic and lattice boom cranes. Link-Belt is headquartered in Lexington, Kentucky, and is a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate, Sumitomo Heavy Industries.

History
Invention of Linked-Belt Chain Drive

In 1874, William Dana Ewart sold farm implements in Belle Plaine, Iowa. He invented a new harvester drive-chain which used a square detachable link -- a "linked belt."

"William Ewart recognized that harvesters with continuous chain belt drives made up of square links and flat links would wear unevenly and break in one spot. Once broken, the entire chain belt had to be taken back to the barn for needed repairs, thus delaying all harvesting." 

In 1875, Ewart and investors founded the Ewart Manufacturing Company to build and market the new detachable drive chain. This later changed to Ewart Detachable Link-Belt.

Expansion Into Coal Handling

In the 1880's, Ewart's company looked to expand into coal handling. Ewart Detachable Link-Belt became Link-Belt Machinery Company. In 1888, the company created a separate Link-Belt Engineering Company for its development efforts.

During this period, cranes and excavators shared many similarities. Steam shovels were mounted on railroad chassis. Temporary rail tracks were laid by workers where the shovel was expected to work, then repositioned as required.

The railroad market provided a successful focus for the growing companies. Link-Belt Machinery began manufacturing railroad coal-handling cranes. Link-Belt Engineering began custom designing and building locomotive coaling stations, building facilities railroads like the New York Central and Hudson, the Philadelphia and Reading, and the Chicago and Western Michigan. (See circa 1984 marketing booklet.) Around 1890, Link-Belt developed the first wide-gauge, steam-powered, coal-handling clamshell-bucket crane.

Through the turn of the century, Link-Belt expanded its line of steam-powered, heavy-duty coal-handling cranes. The line expanded into lighter, more versatile rail-based cranes.

Link-Belt Moves to Chicago, Expands into ExcavationBy the early 1900's, Link-Belt had moved well beyond its initial drive-chain origins. To support the growth, Link-Belt relocated from Iowa to Chicago in 1906. The two companies, Link-Belt Machinery and Link-Belt Engineering, consolidated into a single Link-Belt Company.

The 1900's also brought new technologies to Link-Belt cranes and excavators. Continuous-track crawler systems moved Link-Belt products off the railroad chassis, removing the need for temporary tracks. Dragline excavators expanded the power of crane-shovel systems. By 1922, Link-Belt expanded into this crawler-mounted crane-shovel excavator market, complementing its locomotive cranes and material handling equipment.

As the rail-based market shrank, Link-Belt's crawler-mounted line continued to grow. By the late 1930s, Link-Belt offered excavators ranging from a 3/4-yd to a 2-1/5-yd capacity.

Link-Belt Speeder & Move to Cedar Rapids In 1939, Link-Belt purchased Speeder Machinery and its line of smaller excavators. Merging Speeder with Link-Belt's Crane and Shovel Division expanded crane-shovel excavator line into the smaller capacity 3/8- to 3/4-yard range.

The acquisition also bought Link-Belt immediate entry into the wheel-mounted excavator market. Speeder had developed the world's first wheel-mounted excavator in 1922.

The merged companies formed the Link-Belt Speeder Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Link-Belt Company. The company eventually relocated manufacturing to Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

Disruptive Innovations: Gasoline Power and Hydraulics

This period (post WWII - 1970) put Link-Belt into business history for managing disruptive innovation. Harvard economist Clayton Christiansen analyzed the mechanical excavator industry to understand why disruptive technology innovations frequently cause well-managed companies to fail. Christiansen tracked excavator companies navigating the change to both gasoline power and to hydraulics.

Gasoline power was a less disruptive innovation than hydraulics. Clayton identified Link-Belt as one of thirty-two steam shovel manufacturers operating in the early 1920s. These companies faced a radical technological change to gasoline power changing the architecture of their products. "Where steam shovels used steam pressure to power a set of steam engines to extend and retract the cables that actuated their buckets, gasoline shovels used a single engine and a very different system of gearing, clutches, drums, and brakes to wind and unwind the cable."

Most of the largest manufacturers survived this transition, making gasoline power more of a "sustaining innovation." Following gasoline power, 1928 and onward included less-radical transitions to diesel engines and electric motors. Clayton also noted the surviving companies integrated new articulated-boom technology, "which allowed longer reach, bigger buckets, and better down-reaching flexibility."

Clayton found Link-Belt was part of a more select group surviving the transition to hydraulics. After World War II, excavators moved from cable-actuated systems extending and lifting the bucket to hydraulic mechanisms, which were safer and simpler. Link-Belt was one of about 30 established cable-actuated excavator companies of the 1950s. By 1970, only four of these companies had survived by transitioning to hydraulics: Link-Belt, along with Insley, Koehring, and Little Giant.

Link-Belt faced strong new competition from hydraulic innovators, including Case, John Deere, Drott, Ford, Bamford (JCB), Poclain, International Harvester, Caterpillar, O & K, Demag, Liebherr, Komatsu, and Hitachi. A number of these entrants came to excavators through the invention of the backhoe. These small-capacity excavators initially mounted on the back of tractors, either farm or industrial varieties. This opened the excavator market to general contractors. Link-Belt Speeder succeeded in competing against these new entrants, making it a showcase for managing disruptive innovation. The company adopted the new hydraulic technology quickly. Two years after the 1947 British invention of the backhoe, Link-Belt launched its full-function "Speed-O-Matic" hydraulic control system. It also launched new smaller-capacity excavators on both wheel-based chassis and crawlers.

This early adoption of hydraulics launched Link-Belt Speeder to the forefront of the worldwide crane-shovel market. This culminated in the 1954 flagship model LS-98 crane and crane-excavator, one of the most successful pieces of construction equipment ever built. Production of this model continued for over 42 years (1954 to 1996) with over 7,000 units being shipped. LS-98 units are still in operation around the world.

FMC Link-Belt & Move to Lexington

In 1965, FMC Corporation purchased Link-Belt as a subsidiary. Link-Belt Speeder later became the Construction Equipment Group of FMC Corporation. It branded products with the FMC Link-Belt name, dropping Speeder.

FMC began an aggressive long-term capital expansion plan for manufacturing facilities and product lines. For example, FMC tried to leverage Link-Belt's expertise into its fire truck division. Working with Ladder Towers Inc. (LTI), FMC Link-Belt developed aerial ladder trucks. This venture was unsuccessful and shut down in 1990.

The expansion ended in the early 1980s during the early 1980's recession. FMC consolidated its Link-Belt operations to Lexington, Kentucky. This included the 1985 closure of the Cedar Rapids plant, which had 450 employees manufacturing excavators and both crawler and gantry cranes. Sumitomo, Link-Belt Excavators & Link-Belt Cranes

Sumitomo Heavy Industries now owns the Link-Belt companies. Link-Belt Cranes operates separately from Link-Belt Excavators. Both are wholly-owned subsidiaries based in Lexington, Kentucky. Sumitomo's involvement began when FMC and Sumitomo formed a 1986 joint venture named Link-Belt Construction Equipment Company.

The excavator/materials handling versus cranes separation occurred 1998. The FMC/Sumitomo joint venture (JV) spun off excavator products to a new JV with Case Corporation. The excavator JV became LBX, selling Link-Belt branded excavators.

Sumitomo later acquired full ownership of both joint ventures. It operates Link-Belt Cranes separately from LBX Excavators.