Grove TMS800-2 vs. TMS500-2: Sizing a Truck Crane for the Taxi Work You Actually Do

Grove's truck-mounted crane lineup covers a wider span than most contractors realize, and the TMS500-2 and TMS800-2 sit at two genuinely different points on that span. One is built to be the lightest, most road-friendly truck crane in its class, designed to taxi between small jobs all day without extra permitting headaches. The other brings serious big-crane engineering down into an 80-ton package that still roads cleanly on the highway. Picking between them isn't about which is "better," it's about which class of lift work you actually do.

Both machines are worth understanding on their own terms before you decide which one, or whether either one, fits your crane fleet.

The TMS500-2: Built for Taxi Work, Not Maximum Capacity

Grove unveiled the TMS500-2 at its own Crane Days event in 2018, built specifically for customers who wanted a lightweight, versatile truck crane with real taxi capability, the kind of crane that can run from a small steel-erection job to an HVAC lift to a housing project all in the same day without hauling extra counterweight loads behind it. At 36 metric tons (40 US tons) of capacity, it's not the biggest crane in Grove's lineup, and it was never meant to be.

The TMS500-2 comes with a choice of two boom configurations: a 29 to 95 foot four-section boom with three quick-reeve sheaves, or a 32 to 102 foot version with four sheaves, both full-power and synchronized for fast setup. An optional telescoping swingaway jib stretching 26 to 45 feet extends reach further for jobs that need it. Power comes from a 350 horsepower Cummins ISL engine paired with an Ultrashift automatic transmission, giving it highway travel speeds up to 70 miles per hour, genuinely useful for a crane meant to move between jobs frequently rather than sit parked on one site for weeks.

The TMS500-2 shares its single-person carrier cab with the larger TMS9000-2, Grove's first next-generation truck crane, which debuted at CONEXPO in 2017. That shared cab brings an automotive-style gauge display, multi-function steering with cruise control access, full-vision superstructure visibility, and Grove's Crane Control System with a working range limiter and selectable ECO mode. We've covered the TMS500-2 on its own before, and you can read the full return story of Grove's comeback to the 40-ton truck crane market after roughly twelve years away from that specific class.

The TMS800-2: A Lighter TMS9000-2 for the 80-Ton Class

The TMS800-2 is Grove's successor to the TMS800E, and the upgrade is substantial, not cosmetic. It adopts technology originally developed for Grove's larger truck-mounted and all-terrain cranes and packages it into an 80 US ton unit that still roads easily on four axles. Grove's own product manager described it as essentially a lighter version of the TMS9000-2, sharing that crane's ergonomic cab and counterweight interchangeability, but with a shorter boom and an 80-ton ceiling instead of the 9000-2's higher capacity class.

Compared directly to the TMS800E it replaces, the TMS800-2 picked up a six-cylinder Cummins X12 engine rated at 475 horsepower, a 25-horsepower jump, with maximum torque climbing from 1,550 lb-ft to 1,700 lb-ft. The redesigned, lightweight carrier can road its full 28,000 pounds of counterweight without a fall-off load or wing weights, and in stricter-roading jurisdictions it can still carry 18,000 pounds of counterweight while staying under a 100,000-pound gross vehicle weight and 25,000 pounds per axle. The absence of wing weights also keeps its travel width to a slim 8.3 feet.

The real headline change is MAXbase, Grove's asymmetrical outrigger system, making its debut on a TMS-class crane for the first time with the 800-2. MAXbase lets the outriggers be positioned asymmetrically so the crane can set up as close to a lift as the site allows, even where obstacles block a fully symmetrical outrigger spread, with smart sensors handling length-sensing and auto-leveling. Combined with the Crane Control System's boom configurator, MAXbase helps deliver load charts up to 30 percent stronger overall than the TMS800E, with a 2,100 to 3,750 pound advantage at radii beyond 60 feet.

• Four-section, 40 to 128 foot MEGAFORM boom with Twin-Lock pinning for a broad working range.

• Optional 34.5 to 57.6 foot telescoping swingaway lattice extension, offsettable up to 45 degrees, for a maximum tip height of 194.3 feet.

• Standard Eaton Roadranger 11-forward, 3-reverse manual transmission, with an optional Eaton Fuller UltraShift PLUS automatic.

• Five access and egress points around the chassis, and a camera relay giving the operator a bird's-eye view of up to 653 feet of main-hoist rope deployment.

How These Two Actually Compare on the Job

Put side by side, the gap is really about mission, not just tonnage. The TMS500-2 at 40 US tons is purpose-built for frequent moves between smaller jobs, housing work, steel erection on modest structures, HVAC installs, where taxi speed and minimal permitting friction matter more than raw lifting capacity. The TMS800-2 at 80 US tons is aimed at heavier, often longer-duration work: renewable-energy installations, cell tower erection, and road or bridge projects, where the crane needs to both road efficiently between sites and deliver serious lift charts once it's set up.

The TMS800-2's MAXbase system is the real differentiator for a contractor working constrained urban or industrial sites, since the ability to set up asymmetrically where a full outrigger spread isn't possible opens up lift positions that would otherwise require a different crane class entirely. The TMS500-2 doesn't have MAXbase, but it was never trying to compete on that kind of setup flexibility; its value is in how little it costs you in travel time and permitting hassle between jobs.

What This Means for Your Crane Fleet

A crane rental or erection company doing a high volume of smaller commercial and residential jobs across a metro area is the classic TMS500-2 buyer: frequent moves, modest lift requirements, and taxi capability that keeps the crane earning instead of sitting on a lowboy. A heavy-civil or utility-infrastructure contractor taking on bridge work, tower erection, or renewable-energy projects is the classic TMS800-2 buyer, trading some of that nimbleness for a serious jump in lift capacity and setup flexibility on tight sites.

Plenty of crane operations genuinely need both classes in the same fleet, running the TMS500-2 on bread-and-butter jobs while reserving the TMS800-2 for the bigger contracts that actually justify its capability. If you're deciding between adding a second crane in a different class versus a second unit in the same class you already run, think honestly about which jobs you're turning down right now for lack of the right machine, and you'll usually have your answer. For a broader look at how Grove spaces out its all-terrain lineup by class, our breakdown of the GMK5150XL's place between the GRT780 and GMK8700 covers the same sizing logic from the all-terrain side of the catalog.

Financing Either Class of Grove Truck Crane

Equipment financing through BFC covers both ends of this comparison, whether you're adding a nimble TMS500-2 for high-frequency taxi work or stepping up to an TMS800-2 for heavier, longer-duration lifts. We work with heavy-lift and crane-service contractors nationwide, startups and established operations, with good credit or credit that's taken some hits, and we structure financing around the actual lift revenue your crane generates rather than a generic equipment-loan template.

Renting a crane in a capacity class you don't own means paying premium day rates every time a job calls for it, with no guarantee of availability when you need it most during a busy season. Owning the right class for your typical job, financed on terms matched to your contract cash flow, means that crane is earning for you instead of a rental company every time the phone rings with new lift work. Deposits with BFC range from nothing down for strong credit profiles to a percentage for more complex files, worked out directly with our team based on your actual fleet and contract pipeline.

What Grove Doesn't Say Directly: No Clean Predecessor for the TMS500-2

Worth being honest about here: Grove's own materials frame the TMS500-2 as filling a gap its dealers and customers were asking for, a lightweight taxi-capable truck crane, rather than as a direct successor to one specific prior model the way the TMS800-2 clearly replaces the TMS800E. If you're looking for a clean one-to-one predecessor comparison the way you'd get with the 800-class, it doesn't quite exist for the 500-2 the same way. What it does share, directly, is DNA with the TMS9000-2's carrier cab and control architecture, which is really the more useful comparison point if you're trying to understand where its engineering actually came from.

That distinction matters if you're the kind of buyer who cross-shops generations of the same model before committing. The TMS800-2's upgrade story is easy to quantify against its direct predecessor: more horsepower, more torque, a stronger load chart, and a genuinely new outrigger system. The TMS500-2's story is more about Grove identifying unmet demand in a capacity class and building a purpose-made answer to it, which is a different kind of product decision but no less deliberate.

Maintenance and Parts Commonality Worth Knowing About

Because the TMS500-2 shares its carrier cab architecture with the TMS9000-2, and the TMS800-2 shares its ergonomic cab and counterweight system with the same larger platform, a fleet running multiple Grove truck cranes across these model lines gets real parts and training commonality that a mixed-brand fleet simply doesn't have. Technicians who learn one Crane Control System interface and cab layout carry that knowledge across several models in the lineup, and that shortens ramp-up time when a fleet adds a second or third unit.

This is a real, underappreciated argument for staying within one manufacturer's ecosystem as a crane fleet grows, even when the individual machines serve very different jobs. The training and parts-inventory savings compound every time a new technician joins the crew or a common wear part needs replacing across multiple units.

Working Range and Jobsite Access: The Practical Difference Operators Notice First

An operator moving between these two machines will notice the working-range difference immediately. The TMS500-2's shorter 95 to 102 foot boom options mean a tighter working radius before a jib is even added, well suited to the kind of jobs where the crane sets up close to the lift point anyway. The TMS800-2's 128 foot MEGAFORM boom, extendable to a 194.3 foot tip height with the optional jib, opens up lift geometries the smaller crane simply can't reach, which is exactly the point on a bridge span or a cell tower erection where the crane often can't get as close to the actual lift point as it could on a tighter urban site.

Jobsite access cuts the other way, though. The TMS500-2's lighter overall footprint and standard taxi configuration make it the easier machine to maneuver into a residential street or a cramped commercial lot, exactly the kind of access-constrained site where the TMS800-2's larger footprint and heavier counterweight requirements become a real logistical headache even with MAXbase helping on the outrigger side.

Ready to finance the right Grove truck crane for your lift work? Visit our home page to learn more about BFC, apply for equipment financing today, browse our equipment for sale and financing marketplace, or subscribe to our blog for more crane and heavy-lift equipment breakdowns like this one.