What Is the CM BatteryStar™? Columbus McKinnon’s First Battery-Powered Chain Hoist

Intro

– How can a battery-operated hoist make your lifting jobs easier? Today we’re looking at CM’s new battery-powered chain hoist, the BatteryStar. We’re going to find out how it can improve your lifting operations.

– My name’s Henry Brozyna. I work for Columbus McKinnon as the Industrial Product Trainer.

What Is Columbus McKinnon’s BatteryStar?

The BatteryStar is CM’s first battery-powered hoist. It has a Milwaukee battery for a power source. What’s unique about this hoist, it does go up to a one tonne capacity. It’ll have up to 60 feet of lift. It is totally remote control with no wires whatsoever, obviously none for the power, but also none for the controller as well. It is also infinitely variable speed, so as you can see as I’ll demonstrate, I can go really, really slow, or I can go a little bit faster, and that’s in the up and down position as well.

Who Is the CM BatteryStar For?

BatteryStar is practically for almost anyone. This hoist, because of the one ton capacity, allows it to be moved around very easily. It weighs somewhere in the neighborhood of about 43 to 45 pounds. That’s going to vary a little bit depending on how much chain comes with it.

How Long Does the BatterStar Battery Last?

Obviously, if you’re lifting closer to the one-tonne mark, then yes, that battery’s going to get used up in a shorter amount of time. If you’re lifting 250 pounds to 500 pounds, I’m going to say it’s probably going to last you almost all day. An eight hour shift, basically.

Versatile Operation: Use Inverted or Typical Mounting Orientation

Because I can bring it down to my level, I can go here, open up the hatch, and I can get to the battery easily. Versus if I hung it conventionally, which would be hanging it from this hook here, then the battery is always up high. I would require either a lift or at least a ladder to get to it.

How To Monitor the Battery Life of Your Hoist

On this controller here where you see this black bar going across, it’s actually a window. There’s actually four LED lights in there. One of those LED lights tells you whether or not this unit is starting to run low on energy. That should tell the operator, okay, I got to take the battery out, put a new battery in.

What if the BatteryStar’s Battery Runs Out Mid-Lift?

There’s four screws that hold this cover in place. You remove this cover, you’re going to see basically almost like a one inch to maybe an inch and a quarter diameter hole, and inside that hole, there is a hexagonal shaped shaft for a socket, and you can literally lower or raise this hoist manually if for whatever reason the unit runs out of energy mid-lift.

How To Use the CM BatteryStar Hoist

First of all, once you get a BatteryStar, obviously put the chain bucket on it, hang it properly. There’s usually a couple of threaded C clips that go on there to make sure that the bucket stays secure. And of course the chain goes into the bucket.

I would take out, make sure there’s enough chain that’s out so you can take what would traditionally be the lower hook. We’re going to use that on our upper station. Just take and hook it in. So now the hoist is attached.

I’m going to take the pendant control, take the E-stop button, turn it slightly clockwise. It’ll pop up because it will be depressed. There is a button here that looks like a one. It’s just like a dash line going vertically. What you’re going to do is you’re going to press that button. You see the green light? You hear the tone? That means this controller is pairing with this hoist.

Now you can just operate it like it normally would, up, down, so in this case it’s going to go up. And then it would be just a matter of stopping where you need it to stop.

On the back of the hoist, you can see this little panel, that contains one of those little watch batteries. I think it’s about as big as a nickel. That’s going to pick up the signal coming from the controller, and as long as the light is on, this is active, the hoist is active.

Can Multiple BatteryStars Be Controlled Simultaneously From One Source?

As far as hooking these units up to a computer and trying to run multiple units up and down from one master computer, no, you cannot do that. They need to be paired to an individual pendant control.

What Safety Features Are Built Into the BatteryStar?

As far as the safety features go for a BatteryStar, if you have more than one tonne on this unit, the little light will light up and tell you, “Hey, you got an overload.” Also, there is a mechanical slip clutch in here that will stop the hoist from physically picking that much load up as well.

The other thing as far as safety goes is there is a mechanical load brake in here, not an electronic one like there is in say a LoadStar or any other electric hoist. This one has a mechanical brake, which is very similar to the brakes that you’ll find in manual units.

The other thing is this does have limit switches. There’s a little green and black button here, that is the upper limit, and then there’s the exact same color button down here, that’s the lower limit. When the hoist comes in contact with this hook up here, it activates that button and it opens up the circuit and the hoist stops in that direction. The same holds true with the lowering of the hoist.

What ASME Standards Does the BatteryStar Fall Under?

The BatteryStar satisfies the standards for ASME B30.16, which is Powered Units. The hooks will fall into ASME B30.10.

What Inspections and Maintenance Are Required for the BatteryStar?

You can see this screw right here, this one, you can take that screw out. There’s another one up here on top. If you take those off, there’s a window. That window, you can look inside and you can actually see the brake discs. So when the brake discs are starting to get low, that allows you to inspect them, remove those discs, and put new discs in.

To ensure the reliability of any hoist, a inspection program needs to be set up. Depending on how the hoist is being used and how often the hoist is being used, dictate as far as do I inspect it once a year, do I inspect it twice a year, or do I inspect it three or four times a year? That’s going to have to be determined by the customer.

What Warranties Are Provided With the BatteryStar?

CM offers a five-year warranty on the hoist and the hoisting components. There is a three year warranty from Milwaukee on the battery components.

CM BatteryStar vs. Milwaukee M18 Battery Powered Hoists: What’s the Difference?

As far as the relationship between Milwaukee and Columbus McKinnon is they partnered to create this hoist that is actually a Columbus McKinnon unit. We manufacture these down in our Damascus plant in Virginia.

These units will come basically in two different colors. One is black, one is going to be red. The black ones will have the CM markings on them. The red ones are labeled for Milwaukee.

Columbus McKinnon units will be available up to 60 feet. Milwaukee’s will stop at 20 foot.

What Applications or Industries Should Consider the BatteryStar?

Some of the places where a BatteryStar would be beneficial for customers is they only need a hoist for maybe a day or two. So getting a battery-powered unit is much more easily installed and used and then removed when you don’t need it.

This is a fairly light unit, so it stays under that 50-pound mark, which is what most companies are looking for simply because they don’t want their employees picking up any more than 50 pounds.

How To Find Out More Information About CM’s BatteryStar

The BatteryStar will be available at a number of distributors as well as Mazzella. You can contact any Mazzella rep for information on availability, pricing, they could also probably help you out with your application issues.

I’m actually kind of excited as far as the battery hoist goes. We’ve already got people that have been calling about this. We’ve gotten a lot of good information, a lot of good feedback from people.

– A versatile, portable, easy to install hoist that can speed up your operations and unload some of the burden and strenuous activities for your operators and riggers. Let us know what you think.

Whether you’re looking to hoist 100 pounds or 100 tons, at Mazzella, we have the hoist for your needs. Not to mention we can supply you with your rigging, wire rope, overhead crane, below-the-hook lifting device, service, training, and inspections.

If you found this video useful or informative or you just feel like being friendly, then hit that like button so we can get this information out to everyone who needs it. Subscribe and hit the bell so you never miss video. If you have a question, drop it in the comments so we can get you an answer. Remember, safe rigging is smart rigging. My name’s Ben. Stay safe out there.