Brake pedal went soft over the coop at 40 feet, here's what saved us

Last Thursday I was lifting a roof HVAC unit at a job site near Tacoma, about 40 feet up, when the load started swinging weird in the wind gusts. Felt the pedal get spongy under my boot, that's never a good sign. I set the load down slow, maybe 15 feet above the roof, and killed the swing with my tag line guy waving me off. Turned out a hydraulic line had a pinhole leak from rubbing against the turret frame, oil was dripping onto the counterweight. We checked it during pre-start but it was dry then, must have happened mid-lift from the heat or vibration. I've had brakes fail before on an older Grove and it was a lot scarier, this time the pedal had enough feel to stop. Anyone else ever had a leak show up mid-pick, not during the morning inspection?

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the_faith24d ago

Read a post on a crane forum a while back where a guy had the same thing happen, hose looked fine at start up but started weeping once everything got hot and the pressure built. Something about the rubber getting soft with heat and the pinhole only opening up under full load. That lines up with what you saw, dry at pre-start then dripping mid-pick. Glad you had enough pedal left to set it down clean.

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