Brisbane City Cranes (BCC) provides a complete crane and rigging service, delivering safe and efficient lifting solutions for commercial, residential, and industrial projects. Based in Northgate, Queensland, BCC employees bring over 50 years of combined industry experience to deliver services from site inspections and lift planning to full crane operations. Their modern fleet of cranes ranges from pick and carry cranes to city and all-terrain cranes, supporting up to 150 tons. BCC has earned recognition for complex lifts, including their award-winning dome installation at the Virgin Mary Coptic Church in Calamvale.
The challenge
BCC did not have a central CAD platform to create lift studies that combine inputs from their crane planning tools and Nearmap images. This made it difficult to maintain accuracy, consistency, and efficiency across designs. Producing a single lift study could take up to an hour, and meeting customer expectations for detail and compliance required significant manual effort. As project complexity increased, the team needed a more reliable and scalable solution that could bring all design elements into a single environment.
The solution
After a trial period, BCC selected Octave BricsCAD to modernize their lift study process and improve both accuracy and speed. The transition was very smooth, thanks to compatibility with current tools and familiar features, as well as the designer’s extensive experience in CAD. Within just a few days, Lift Designer Tim Marchbank was producing complete lift studies in BricsCAD. As templates and custom LISP routines were refined, the time to create a lift study decreased from an hour to around 40 minutes.
“The transition was rapid and smooth. BricsCAD is more than a capable alternative with functionality on par or exceeding the other options,” said Marchbank.
He uses BricsCAD Pro for 2D drafting and 3D modeling in a unified platform.
BCC’s lift studies involve producing detailed lift plans, feasibility studies, and crane configurations for clients across sectors including HVAC, roofing, industrial construction, and commercial development. BricsCAD now sits at the center of this workflow, supporting the entire lift design process from importing georeferenced Nearmap imagery to assembling crane configurations, calculating radii, loads, and ground bearing pressures, and visualizing clearances in 3D. Parametric blocks allow Marchbank to switch between crane types instantly, while in-house LISP routines, automated tables, and fields help streamline calculations and improve consistency. The result is a faster, more accurate, and more efficient process for every project.
“Now our lift studies have taken the next step, and we can promote them,” noted Marchbank.
Delivering an award-winning lift project
BCC developed a lifting solution for the installation of the main dome at the Virgin Mary Coptic Church in Calamvale, Queensland. After detailed planning and engineering analysis, the company successfully completed the lift using a two-crane operation. The project was recognized at the 2025 Crane Industry Council of Australia awards, where it won both the People’s Choice Lift of the Year and Lift of the Year awards in the under-20-ton category.
“The award proves to me that we’re on the right track! No reason to change from what we’re using — BricsCAD has all the features we need,” said Marchbank.
Phase 1: Model creation
Using a combination of aerial photos and building plans, Marchbank constructed a full 3D model of the church, the dome, and the surrounding structures entirely in BricsCAD. This model became the foundation for evaluating lift options, analyzing boom lengths, checking clearances over smaller domes, and determining rigging requirements. BricsCAD’s 3D environment allowed the team to visualize the lift from every angle and verify that the dome could be safely maneuvered into place.
Phase 2: Lift analysis
After the 3D model was completed, Marchbank analyzed the design, project requirements, and lifting parameters to evaluate multiple lifting options. The final solution used two cranes and divided the operation into two stages:
- Transfer the dome from the construction area to a temporary laydown location using a single-crane lift.
- Install the dome from the laydown location to its final position using a dual-crane lift.
This approach enabled Marchbank to finalize the crane selection and lift plan while accounting for key factors, including:
- Crane setup locations
- Pick, slew, and place radii and crane capacities
- Boom lengths required to clear the smaller domes already in place
- Rigging design, capacities, weights, and spreader bar requirements
- Total lift weights, including hooks, rigging, and operational allowances
Phase 3: Lift study creation
Once the lift parameters were finalized, Marchbank developed the lift study using BCC’s template and BricsCAD features to create:
Custom properties that automatically populate title block fields, including drawing number, client name, project name, and revision.
Table fields that automate lifting capacity and ground bearing pressure (GBP) calculations.
Marchbank also developed a series of blocks in BricsCAD for lift studies:
2D crane plan blocks with visibility states that allow different crane configurations to be selected as needed.
3D crane models attached as Xrefs for visualization, height verification, and clearance checks.
These features help BCC create accurate, consistent lift studies while reducing manual work.
The results
Since adopting BricsCAD, BCC has improved productivity, accuracy, and efficiency across its lift design workflow. Lift studies are completed faster, with greater confidence in crane positioning, clearances, and load calculations. By combining georeferenced imagery, client design files, and 3D crane models in a single environment, BCC has improved the quality and consistency of its deliverables. Ongoing enhancements to templates, block libraries, and custom LISP routines have further increased accuracy and reduced design time.
“BCC has found BricsCAD to be an excellent and suitable tool for producing lift study documentation. By using BricsCAD and combining drawings, data, text, tables, PDFs, Charts, and GBP calculations within a single file, BCC has streamlined the production of lift studies for crane jobs, providing customers with a higher quality output,” concluded Marchbank.
To see why Octave BricsCAD is the true CAD alternative and how it can support your company’s success, download a free trial today.
Australia
Building
Brisbane City Cranes
- brisbanecitycranes.com.au
