I can't think of a better place to ask this, so here goes. My father designed and built a very tall (variable 12-14' or so) gantry crane many years ago, entirely out of wood. Lots of angled 2x4 and 2x6, bolted together with hundreds of long capscrews and threaded rods. Top member is two 2x10s with a couple huge sheaves in between. Chains for stabilising the legs and securing things, variable leg angle and length, and all sorts of interesting features. Also have a matching boat lift for it.
Dad (died youngish two years ago) was a retired aerospace engineeer with time in the space program and all sorts of other interesting ventures. He originally created it to pull engines, figuring it was no fun to rent a hoist. You know the type. The boat use came along later.
Anyway, the problem is that it's so huge I can't keep it set up, and it's so complex and intricate I almost never have the time to set it up for a project. Having recently bought cheap ($35) and repainted a 2-ton engine hoist, I have almost no use for this mammoth device in my normal lifting tasks.
So this is the long way of asking if you guys think people would be interested in buying this thing, and would it even be a good idea to have someone else use it? I'd hate to see all the time he and I (as a kid) spent working on it just get chopped up and burned, but the thought of an old homemade device made out of wood and used for lifting large, heavy weights, scares me. It would be most uncool to have someone squashed beneath whatever they were working with if it failed. But so many hours went into this contraption...
Sorry for all the typing, it's a strangely hard decision for me.
GTO(John)