Unknown to many, human beings have already built insanely massive machines and they roam around the earth to make a lot of heavy-duty tasks easier for us. Some of these gigantic machines are fixed firmly on the ground, but what’s astounding is that some of these monster machines can be driven and moved. From aircraft transporters to earth excavators, these machines were created to serve as our muscles to perform other ginormous functions that may be physically impossible even for a battalion of beefed up men carry out.
Wonder how insanely massive these machines are? Some of these machines make the ground tremble when they move. Some can bore a giant hole on the earth that is virtually impossible to do even in hundreds of years if we just used shovels. While most of these machines were built on site due to their size, still some massive parts of them have been transported from one place to another in order to complete them. Thus, this involved some of the heaviest hauls but we all made it possible.
Have your mind blown as you check out these insanely massive machines that will certainly feel how tiny you are on the face of the Earth.
10. METSO MOBILE CRUSHER
When other machines dig and clear up rocks, dirt and earth, the Metso Mobile Crusher makes it easier to deal with the rubble that needs to be removed. It is an easier way to transport rubble away from the site. The Metso Mobile Crusher is one of the biggest mobile crushers around. It can crush up to 1,550 tons of rubble per hour. This huge machine was built with tank-like tracks so it can easily move around any surface, even on rough terrains in mines and quarries. The Metso Mobile Crusher measures 64-foot-long, 11.5-foot-wide, and 12.5-foot-tall. It has a 27-cubic-yard hopper that feeds into a V-shaped jaw crusher. Then, the rubble gets dropped on a moving plate to pulverize it.
9. BIG BRUTUS
Located in Kansas, the Big Brutus is world’s most massive electric shovel. The giant machine stands at 160 feet or as tall as a 16-storey building. The huge electric shovel weighs 5,500 tons. It is painted orange and it used to scoop rocks and dirt off the coal seam in a strip mine. Each scoop it made can fill up three railroad cars. The Big Brutus took 52 men and 11 months to get fully assembled. It worked 24/7 for 11 years until the nearby mine was shut down in 1974. Since it was not practical to disassemble it and remove it from where it is located, the locals just transformed it into a museum. Over the decades, the community where it was installed has become fond of the monstrous machine.
8. NASA CRAWLER-TRANSPORTER
Carrying rockets from all over the earth’s surface for over 50 years, the two NASA Crawler-Transporters have served so much of their purpose. Still, they will continue their function until the agency sends rockets to Mars. NASA are modifying these transporters to carry the agency’s Space Launch System (SLS) with the Orion spacecraft atop it and potential commercial vehicles to their pads to begin space exploration missions. Each of these gigantic machines is 131 feet long and 114 feet wide. They have four pickup points spaced 90 feet apart on the upper deck that fit into four interface locations on the mobile launcher.
7. QUEEN OF THE NETHERLANDS
One of the most massive machines on the face of the earth, or on the sea, actually, is the Queen of the Netherlands. It serves a noble purpose of working as world’s largest floating vacuum cleaner. Built in 1998, this vessel is a heavyweight straggling suction hopper dredging ship. The Queen of the Netherlands is so huge in size that its drag head measures 6 m or 20 feet wide. The giant sea vessel can search up to 115 m or 377 feet deep. It helps clean the ocean and hopefully preserve the environment.
6. LARGE HADRON COLLIDER
The Large Hadron Collider is the world’s largest particle accelerator machine. It measures 27 km and serves as the highest-energy particle accelerator in the world. They projected it to collide opposite particle beams. The European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) built this massive machine to experiment on several estimates of high-energy physics. The Hadron Collider is installed beneath the Franco-Swiss border near Geneva, Switzerland. More than 10,000 scientists and engineers from more than 100 universities all over the world finance and operate this mega machine.
5. RUSSIAN ZUBR-CLASS LCAC
The USSR knows how to create military warfare and they know how to make it massive. The Russian Zubr-class landing craft air cushion (LCAC) is a gigantic as the Typhoon Class ballistic submarines and the Kirov Class Battle Cruisers. Right now, even China are creating something as huge as the LCAC and it is said to be the country’s main access weapon. Designed and created in the 1980s, the LCAC was way ahead of its time. It measured 187 feet long by 84 feet wide. It sits on a pontoon-like central hull that was specially created not to detonate magnetic sea mines using active magnetic signature control system and alloy armor. At present, it is the biggest military hover craft in the whole world.
4. OVERBURDEN CONVEYOR BRIDGE F60
The gigantic Overburden Conveyor Bridge F60 is the world’s largest movable “bridge”. Technically, it is used to carry and move construction materials and other heavy types of machinery. Hence, it serves as a massive movable bridge when operated. This mega machine is 502 meters long, 202 meters wide, and 80 meters high. It weighs 11,000 tons. It was operated for about 13 months. However, due to its huge energy consumption, which was deemed impractical, the machine was shut off. At present, the Overburden Conveyor Bridge F60 is kept in Lichterfield and just serves as a huge “Lying Eiffel Tower.”
3. BIG MUSKIE
The Big Muskie is one of the biggest machines to ever surface on the face of the earth. It is located in southeast Ohio. This giant electric-powered Bucyrus-Erie dragline took three years to build. The machine started doing its job in 1969, removing overburden from coal formations. However, in 1991, due to the decrease in demand for high-sulfur coal, the Big Muskie ceased operations and was parked where it is located until it was needed again. The giant dragline weighs 13,500 tons with a bucket capacity of 325 tons or can fill up 12 car garages. It measures 222 feet 6 inches in height and 151 feet 6 inches in width. Its cable diameter is at 5 inches. It can move with its hydraulically driven walking feet.
2. THE CAPTAIN
The Captain was one of the biggest single mining shovels ever made. This huge machine technically known as Marion 6360 weighs close to 28 million lbs. It is made mostly of steel and iron. The main purpose of The Captain was to remove overburden at the Captain Mine in Illinois. Its bucket can hold 180 cubic yards of dirt. Even when empty, The Captain weighs 150 tons. Its bucket measures 18 1/2 feet wide, 16 feet high and 24 1/2 feet deep and could hold 270 tons of dirt at a time. It stands 22 stories high. This giant mining shovel was operated between 1965 and 1991.
1. KRUPP DIGGING MACHINE
The largest digging machine in the whole world, the Krupp Digging Machine is simply an insanely massive rotating shovel. Although the rotating feature may be unnecessary in the excavation process, they found it practical to install it as a self-propelled machine to try and transport it via traditional haulage equipment. This massive machine stands at 95 meters high and 215 meters long, which is about 2.5 football fields in length. It weighs 45,500 tons. It took five years to design and build the Krupp Digging Machine. An investment of $100 million was needed to build this machine from the ground up.
