Hook Drift in Cranes: Causes, Limits, and How to Fix It
Hook drift is the uncontrolled downward slide of a crane hook or load after the controller has been returned to zero, beyond the permitted braking distance. It is also called load drift, and it means the hoist brake is no longer holding the way it was designed to. Any drift beyond the limit should be treated as a safety fault, not a nuisance. The difficulty is that a small slip is easy to ignore. The hook settles a few centimeters, the operator corrects it, and the shift carries on. But hook drift rarely stays small. A contaminated brake surface, a worn lining or a mis-set spring gets worse with every lift, and the same defect that lets a load sink 20 cm today can let it fall tomorrow. This guide gives you the allowable drift limits for overhead cranes, gantry cranes and electric hoists, with a worked calculation. It then covers the six most common causes, a symptom-to-cause diagnostic table, practical fixes, and the design choices that prevent hook drift in high-duty work. Hook drift is the non-commanded downward movement…