This was a really fun and very challenging little project to put together. This was another Assassin’s Creed: Revelations inspiration.
While working on my Griffin Harbor city and wharf terrain board I constantly referenced some screen captures that I took from ACR.
One “must have” item that I kept going back and looking at was the crane that kept appearing in various scenes throughout the game. It seemed like a perfect fit for the project I was already working on so I decided to make some sketches and just start building it.
The crane in ACR (pictured right) reminded me a lot of a couple of Leonardo da Vinci models that I built as a kid, which is why I think I was really keen on the idea of trying to build one of these myself.
Not really having a plan, other than a couple of images that I snapped while playing ACR, I decided to approach the project from a mathematical standpoint and try to work out the dimensions in ratios.
I must have had some intense, temporary stroke of mathematical genius while creating this thing because I couldn’t tell you now how I did it if you paid me! It made sense at the time, the measurements all worked out, and I ran with it.
The end result turned out really well with only a few minor modifications needed to add some additional weight to the back of the crane to keep it from tipping over when lifting a load (yes, it does work!).
The crane can hold approximately a 1-ounce load without tipping over–which works out just fine considering the heaviest resin crates and barrels that I have don’t weight more than that.
I’m going to wind up building a couple of balsa wood skids/pallets to attach to the hook sometime in the near future.
The gears that turn the winch are Lego pieces, as are the pulleys/flywheels that the rope slides over. I was going to try to hunt down some watch parts (gears, etc. etc. etc.) and craft something of brass but got too anxious and wanted to finish it. Maybe some day I’ll go back and re-work that whole section. Personally I think it would be much cooler with a clockwork-type winch rather than a Lego-based one, but for now, it works and it works well.
