[mant]

Does anyone know of a stone lifting tool capable of lifting granite blocks that weigh about 2000lbs? I'm thinking of something that looks like a tong, I have used one for granite curbs and that works slick but the blocks are 4'x18"x18" and I have to pinch them along the long sides. 1 side is going to be rocked faced and the other just a snapped edge. I really don't want to use straps but if I have to it can work.
Any thoughts?

[4seasons]

If you have a unilock plant near you they have tongs used to lift their large block( weigh about the same)

[Paul]

Check Pave Tech they have a stone clamp that works up to 32" I have one

[landstyles]

Found these guys online The EZ-Set Multi Purpose Placing Tool I'm thinking about something like they have.

[Robin Ramsay]

Rock Jaw Rock Moving Equipment check this out let me know if you get one .

[Stoneage3000]

Redi-Rock uses a clamp for their 4ft block that weighs about 2,500 lbs. I believe it's the same as the one mentioned above from Pave Tech...just bigger.

[Squizzy Taylor]

We use friction type clamps for lifting stone blocks almost everyday. Rather than scissors we find an odd leg arrangement is better. I'll have to dredge up so pics. The blocks we lift are typically 550 or 1100lbs and we have some smaller clamps for 200lb blocks.

[dan deutekom]

We built some clamps in the shop using some heavy angle iron and chain that clamp on by friction. We have lifted over 2000 lbs with it without any problem. Cheap and simple. I think I posted some pictures of it a few years back.

[Stonehenge]

I think you did, too. I remember seeing those pics. Ah - here they are.

[Stoneage3000]

Be careful of home-made tools. There are design requirements and if, God forbid, there is ever an accident, your $30 tool will cost you your business!! Even w/o an accident, if OSHA decides to pay your site a visit, you'll pay. Seems to me OSHA has definitelytaken an interest in small construction (if they want revenue, they know where to get it).

[dan deutekom]

Stoneage3000 is right. Times have changed a lot since we built those. They were built when you didn't need to be certified to run a crane, you could ride in the back of the pickup and you didn't need an engineers stamp to build a tool. We used to always weld a couple of chain hooks to the bucket of the loader for lifting and that is now a no-no too. Sometimes I miss the older simpler days where you just made things work. The thing is that a lot of these home made tools work better than the commercial ones.

[4seasons]

Dan your tools are how I first found this site!
they work well for us. I think it cost me 200 dollars to
get mine made.
Only thing I dont like is if your trying to fit solid steps in between two walls.
then you cant get them out. easy.
be nicer if we could grip front andback instead of the sides.

[Squizzy Taylor]

As I said above we tend to use an odd leg clamp with the hinge at one side of the block, although we do have a scissor clamp for longer stone. The advantage of the odd leg is you can fit a lock open (with gravity release/tension off).

When the clamp is locked open by the mason, after the stone is positioned, then the machine operator just lifts the clamp off with no back straining for the mason. Then, because the clamp is odd legged, it will hang uneven, with one jaw lower then the other. A good machine operator will swing to the next stone and catch the face with the clamp and lower until the tension comes off and clamp releases such that it grabs. This means the operator never gets off the machine (well mostly). This allows two men to build a stone wall.

Scissor clamps tend to lift level and you can't catch a stone very easily when the clamp faces are both hanging even.

Here are some dodgey pics but I never took and specifically of the clamps:

[Squizzy Taylor]

I should mention that by drilling a few extra holes in the long leg different sizes can be accomodated by shifting the hinge pin.

Keeping the block level is done by varying the position of the lifting shackle, again, usually by drilling a few different holes for different centres of gravity (size of blocks).

Here is a pic of our 1 metre end clamp in scissor style. This clamp is proprietry made and about as handy as a hip pocket in a singlet straight from the factory. It requires considerable modification to work properly and safely. The upper scissor arms can be replaced with chain. This clamp lifts 1500 lbs in a blink....but I rarely use it anymore having customised the 2nd clamp in the pic above (on the baby Kubota) to the point where it is universal. BTW, in the pic above the angle iron clamp faces are for 14" stone blocks...but my smart..... nephew is using the inside faces to clamp some 10" stone.....cause another mason "borrowed" one of my clamps and very kindly has not returned it....where is the steam out ears smiley.

[Squizzy Taylor]

I should mention that we use these clamps predominantly on quarry cut and reconstitued limestone (and a few other sedimentary stones). They need to be finely tuned to lift diamond (machine) cut metamorphic stones such as granite or marble, if it has a low coefficient of friction (polished type finish). The inside grabbing faces of our clamps are built up with hard facing to give a rough "grippy" surface. This has worked well on the softer stones or rough broken surfaces. I once laid some polished granite steps and got the jitters on the $$$$ so I laid them with soft slings.

The is more than a little experience that goes into setting these types of clamps up but I would need to take some more detailed pics if anybody is interested. The end result though is a huge labour saving device that we, quite literally, couldn't survive without.