ASME B30 Series

The ASME B30 'Safety Standard for Cableways, Cranes, Derricks, Hoists, Hooks, Jacks, and Slings' is published by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers as a multi-volume series. Each volume governs a distinct equipment class: B30.2 covers overhead and gantry cranes, B30.3 hammerhead tower cranes, B30.5 mobile and locomotive cranes, B30.9 slings, B30.10 hooks, B30.20 below-the-hook lifting devices, and so on. The volumes establish requirements for construction, installation, operation, inspection, testing, and maintenance.

B30 is a consensus standard, not a law in itself — it is developed by industry committees rather than a regulator. But it carries regulatory force two ways. First, OSHA incorporates specific provisions and editions by reference into its own standards (for example, mobile-crane rules in Subpart CC reference B30 practices). Second, B30 represents the recognized industry good practice that OSHA's General Duty Clause can be enforced against even where no specific standard applies.

For inspection, B30 volumes generally define frequent inspections (daily to monthly, by a designated person) and periodic inspections (one to twelve months depending on use and environment, by a qualified person), with criteria for wire-rope replacement, hook deformation limits, and structural deficiencies. These criteria are why a crane or rigging inspection checklist often cites a B30 volume rather than, or alongside, an OSHA section.

Because B30 is the technical backbone many manufacturers and inspectors design to, knowing which volume governs your equipment — B30.5 for a mobile crane, B30.9 for the slings on its hook, B30.2 for a shop overhead bridge crane — tells you which inspection criteria and replacement thresholds actually apply.