First ZAT4500V853 in Panama leaves the handover ceremony and lifts steelwork on the metro the same night
Zoomlion has handed over its first ZAT4500V853 all-terrain crane in Panama, and the machine was working on a Panama Metro site the same evening, setting heavy steel structures inside a tight footprint.
From handover to hook work in hours
The unit is the first crane of its type Zoomlion has placed with a Panamanian customer, and the manufacturer describes it as a breakthrough for its lifting business in the country. Instead of standing on a yard after the ceremony, the ZAT4500V853 was moved straight to a Panama Metro construction site on the evening of the handover and started work overnight.
Its opening assignment was the positioning of large steel structural components. The job called for a series of heavy lifts at close quarters, with the crane restricted to a limited working area — conditions that put the emphasis on fine control and on keeping a sensible margin against the load chart rather than on headline capacity. Zoomlion says the crane held its stability under load through continuous operations and that the section kept to its milestone programme.
Commissioning treated as training
The handover was run as a combined acceptance and instruction exercise rather than a paper exchange. Zoomlion’s service team worked through equipment acceptance, site-specific commissioning and operational handover with the customer’s management, operating and maintenance staff.
Chinese technical specialists worked alongside local service engineers on the points that matter most on a machine of this size: boom combinations, use of the superlift device and counterweight matching. Practical, hands-on sessions followed, with the customer’s crew involved throughout. According to Zoomlion the customer’s feedback singled out the crane’s lifting performance, the precision of its electronic control system and its behaviour under heavy loads.
Building a Central American base
Panama’s rail transit and large municipal projects are the kind of work Zoomlion is targeting with its bigger all-terrain models, where restricted sites and repeated heavy picks are the norm. The company says the Panama job confirms the adaptability of its cranes in those conditions.
Behind the delivery sits a service structure that Zoomlion has been assembling across Panama and the wider Central American region. It combines resident Chinese engineers with locally recruited service staff and is intended to cover the full cycle — delivery, assembly and commissioning, maintenance and repair, and operator training. The manufacturer says it intends to deepen its presence in the region on the strength of that network as much as on the products themselves.
Source: Zoomlion — Photos: Zoomlion