When it comes to the gadget race, every developmental dollar is spent getting things smaller and smaller.  Tiny phones, tiny MP3 players, netbooks… everything is shrinking down to spy-sized.  However, what about building things larger?  I’m not just talking about televisions or home theaters, I’m talking about the gigantic diesel engines, extra-jumbo jets, and Wired’s monstrous mechanical marvels.

While there are some familar objects on the list, it’s the unfamiliar ones I’m more intrigued by Take, for instance, the TAKRAF Bagger 293, the Guinness World Record-holder for largest and heaviest land vehicle in the world.  It’s 314.9 feet tall, 738.2 feet long, weighs 13,500 tons, and can move an estimated 240,000 cubic meters of coal a day.  That’s definitely a gigantic gadget; since the RWG Power AG coal mine in Hambach, Germany uses five of them, I’d imagine that’s a pretty sizable coal operation, too.

However, I have questions.  Why is it so big?  Who knows.  I don’t see why several smaller (cheaper) vehicles couldn’t do the job just as well, but if you have it, you may as well use it.  When it breaks down, I’d imagine you’re kind of screwed since there’s probably not a lot of extra-huge drive chains laying around.

Tags: giant vehicles, giant gadgets, industrial equipment, world’s largest vehicles, TAKRAF, Bagger 293, RWG Power AG, Hambach, Germany, Tagebau Hambach

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