Early 60's Bantam T-350.

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I have posted about this crane in the past but never any pictures, But before we get to that I will give you all a little history of this crane. In or around 1961 my good friend and neighbors father, Les Scudder, took a 1953 Reo 2 1/2 ton 6X6 out to the Bantam factory in Waverly, Iowa to have this T-350 mounted for my former employer Rollin Callahan. Rollin was the only owner of this machine until I bought and saved it from the scrap yard. Unfortunately all but the crane, head and base sections of boom, a grapple and a clam were the only things that didn't get scrapped. It had '75 worth of boom, a 12' 6" jib, pile leads, a few dragline buckets, hoe, shovel, and bolt on tracks. In its day it was a well set-up machine, I have been putting the pieces back together and have been all over the northeast getting the pieces, as far as New Hampshire for a 10' main section, head and base also. So enough of boring you folks with its history, and on to the pictures.



Cab and chassis

These 3 pictures are when it first came back, ironically, the field in the background is where our new home was built.

 

[mitch504]

If you know where I can still get a new Bantam crane for $6300, I'll take two.

 

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At the Bantam factory, Les and Rollin setting trusses for a church, mine's on the right.

 

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Crushing junk cars.

 

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These last two are from when I moved the crane without any boom attached, I did have the upper chained to the lower and was moving very cautiously on fairly flat ground. The swing brake was on and the chain mysteriously came free and it ever so slowly swung downhill, I did have to time run around and pull that outrigger beam out to prevent any more damage. 5 minutes with some blocking, a 2 legged chain and the 1085 and we were back in business.

 

[bigshow]

If anyone can make the smaller pictures bigger, please do, I have spent an hour scanning and cropping and can't do any better, sorry.

 

[Knocker of rock]

If anyone can make the smaller pictures bigger, please do, I have spent an hour scanning and cropping and can't do any better, sorry.

They seem sized about right. In fact, you could even make them a smidge bigger if you arranged them all vertically.

Press enter between attachments, and they will go from this



to this



It's hard to see, but in the upper screen shot, the attachments are arranged horizontally. The browser will (or will try) to post these horizontally, wether you have one or fifty photographs. In the second screen shot, I have pressed "enter" between the screen shots, and they are now arranged vertically, which is a much better thing on almost all web pages.

As far as file size, most of us are given rigid choices by our software. There are custom options, but most of us will use what Mac or MSFT tells us to use. I think your photographs are sized just fine.

 

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I drove 1,100 miles one day to get this 20' jib and 10' straight section, and while shooting the breeze with the gentleman he mentioned he had an old Bantam dealership sign. Obviously had to have it, here it is, it lit right up too!

 

[ValleyFirewood]

Looks warm wherever you are!

 

[bigshow]

N.Y., It is seasonal, Mild summers, mild winters, nothing to extreme, just right.

 

[bigshow]

An old friend with whom I used to work with happened to see me driving my Bantam down the road quite early this morning. The outfit we worked for in the past had sold out and he was given all the old shop manuals, this gentleman went home and got me a binder that is all of 4" thick filled with all kinds of Bantam paperwork, manuals, specs, Bantam KNOW HOW brochures. All kinds of awesomeness basically, so here are a few pages I scanned.

 

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[glenlunberg]

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I think the kid on the 3rd picture will going to be a crane operator someday. Anyway, nice pictures of cranes.

 

[BE&Bantam]

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Bigshow.

Hope you are well.
We have an early C350 set up as a dragline.
Do you still have your Bantam manuals?
If so, would consider paying the cost for you to have them digitally scanned to a thumb drive and shipped to us.
In the alternative, would appreciate guidance on another source for those materials, other than JEN SALES.

Thank you.