AGD distributing Marchetti

Crawler crane and piling equipment company AGD has become UK and Ireland distributor for Marchetti cranes. The long-established Midlands-based crawler crane rental and sales specialist will offer the Italian manufacturer's range of telescopic crawler, truck and all terrain cranes.

The initial investment is more than £1 million (US$1.55 million), including spare parts and training. Robert Law, AGD managing director, forecasts sales of around a dozen units in 2012, most of them truck mounted cranes.

AGD will add a pair of 70 tonne capacity Sherpa CW70.42 telescopic crawler cranes to its rental fleet in early 2012. The heavy duty model has a 42 metre boom and is suitable for piling applications, AGD said.

The new crawler range will complement the company's existing offering of IHI crawler cranes from Japan. While most are larger lattice boom models, there is a 50 tonne telescopic model that will fit in below the Sherpa. There are also plans for 25 and 90 tonne capacity Marchetti tele crawlers in the near future to make a braod line up.

The Marchetti range of truck mounted cranes will further broaden AGD's offer. In addition to the existing models, Law forecasts that a new 25 tonne capacity model in development will be popular in the UK as it will be available to fill a gap in the market.