Roland Machinery Raises Bar With Crane Product Support

Mon August 18, 2003
Crane Equipment Guide

Roland Machinery, a full-service equipment distributor with more than 40 years in the business, has launched an extensive crane product support program conveniently located to handle repair needs in the Chicago metro region and beyond.

Based in the company’s new 14.000-sq.-ft. branch in Portage, IN, the Roland program offers minor repairs to major rebuilds.

The program includes services such as repairing both hydraulic and friction cranes, and performing OSHA-mandated annual crane inspections by Crane Institute of America-certified technicians.

In addition to working with cranes on-site at Roland’s facility, technicians are available to travel wherever the customer needs them to go, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Also available is a mobile crane safety program, either in-house at Portage, or on the customer’s job site.

Roland’s ongoing relationships with crane manufacturers including Link-Belt, Manitowoc, Grove, Terex, P & H, Lima and others will allow the company to obtain OEM parts quickly from suppliers throughout the Chicagoland area.

While the crane product support program is relatively new, it is backed up by the extensive experience and expertise of division head and service manager Gary Hammond.

Hammond has been working with equipment for 25 years, first with a general contractor in Chicago for 16 years, and then with a branch of All Erection called Central Rent-a-Crane, where he gained much of his experience.

Later, Hammond moved to Crane & Machinery, where he developed a remanufacturing program, and built an extensive crane service department, at one time employing 25 technicians.

Leading the crane product support program at Roland Machinery’s Portage, IN, branch, Hammond expects to build on his long experience. As time goes on, Hammond hopes to expand not only the scope of crane repair services offered but the geographic area the program serves.

“Working out of the Portage facility, we concentrate first of all on northwest Indiana, but are getting a lot of calls from the Chicago area, so we’ve been out as far as Rockford and down by Champaign,” Hammond said. “So, we’re probably covering a 150-to-200-mile radius at this point, and are looking to expand as customers discover what we are doing over here.”

Roland’s Portage branch is located at 6450 Melton Road, on Route 20, about 1 mi. east of Route 249, and a couple of minutes off I-94.

For more information, call 219/764-8080.