The 20,000th crane from Liebherr Ehingen factory. Celebrating are, from left to right, Hans-Georg Frey, Liebherr Ehingen sales and marketing director, Mrs and Mr Doron Livnat, managing director of Dutch customer Hovago, Ulrich Hamme, R&D director, Mario Trunzer, finance director and Hubert Hummel, production director.
Back at the start of the 60s, Liebherr had already been developing auto cranes with a tower-crane structure in neighbouring Biberach. These were followed by auto cranes with luffing lattice booms and, as of 1969, also by auto cranes with telescopic booms, the production of which was subsequently moved the new factory in Ehingen.
The AUK auto crane series eventually comprised telescopic boom and lattice cranes on two- to four-axle chassis, with lifting capacities of up to 80 t. During the 70s, this series was replaced by the Liebherr LT telescopic truck crane series and by the Liebherr LG lattice boom mobile crane series with load capacities of up to 400 t. At the same time, telescopic cranes for industrial use (LI series) and off-road cranes (LTL series) were designed and manufactured in large numbers.
In 1977 the engineers at Ehingen developed the first all-terrain mobile crane, the LTM 1025, the company claims. Its design enabled a combination of road and off-road use at an unprecedented level of perfection. It combined the advantages of the road crane with those of the off-road crane. Its basic concept became the template for the whole LTM mobile crane series, which by the mid 80s included models with two to eight axles.
