Crane industry news Archives | Page 24 of 37

Terex crane meets space challenges in factory

A Terex Challenger 3160 all terrain crane has helped a salt and fertiliser manufacturer overcome space restrictions and the highly saline atmosphere in its factory.

German mobile crane company H & S Autokrane used the Challenger at the facilities of Kassel-based Kali- und Salzwerke to install and remove pipelines.

The three-axle, 55t Challenger 3160 features a 50m boom system which met requirements of the project including hoisting pipelines and steel elements 42m for assembly into an existing structure, and hoisting with a wide radius for moving underneath pipeline bridges.

The crane overcame various complications during the project including navigating a narrow approach, which at some points allowed a width of 2.6m and a height of 3.6m. Drains passing underneath the workspace limited the weight for the job to 40t, as well as restricting the use of half of the outrigger extension for parts of the project while still requiring the full counterweight.

Jens Hartung, field crew member at Hesse-based H & S Autokrane, said: “We were able to master even this task with our Challenger.
“To work here, a crane needs to be really small when it pulls in, and large with a long boom in the structures. Moreover, it needs to be able to lift heavy loads. The Challenger 3160 all terrain crane comes the closest to fulfilling this ideal.”

BKL adds second GMK6300L to its fleet

German crane rental company BKL Baukran Logistik has added a second Grove GMK6300L all terrain crane to its fleet.

Manufactured by Manitowoc, the first 300t GMK6300L purchased by BKL completed 1,500 working hours in a year, leading to the German company’s addition of a second unit.

The GMK6300L is based in Frankfurt and is used primarily for inner-city job sites where space is limited, and for erecting and dismantling tower cranes.

Based at Forstinning, near Munich, BKL has a fleet of more than 330 tower cranes and almost 40 mobile cranes.

GMK6300L assists with children’s hospital project

A 300t Grove GMK6300L all terrain crane has been used to install five air handling units on the roof of a nine-storey building at London’s Great Ormond Street Hospital.

UK-based City Lifting lifted the 4t units at a radius of 54m using only the crane’s main boom, as the limited space in central London prevented the company from rigging a fly jib.

To reach the site of the children’s hospital the crane also had to navigate a hole which had been dug in the adjoining access road.

The lifts, which represented the first time City Lifting had used its GMK6300L, were completed in a day.

Zoomlion installs wind turbines in Iran

An 800t Zoomlion QUY800 crawler crane has been used to install turbines on a wind farm in Takistan, Iran.

The crawler, with a 108m jib and 7m extension, is being used on the Kahak Wind Farm, which is being built to ease the pressure on the power supply in Tehran.

The crane is installing wind turbine towers, rotors, blades and housings. The top section of the towers weigh more than 30t, with the turbines almost 100m high and weighing 350t.

Kahak Wind Farm is situated on a plateau to benefit from the windy conditions, but this also makes installation more complex, as the top housing has to be installed within a certain period of time to prevent the wind causing the tower to tilt and bend.

The high altitude, strong winds and heavy lifting mass means the average installation time for each turbine has been over a month. So far 10 turbines have been successfully installed.

Liebherr crawler reaches new heights

A Liebherr LTR 1220 telescopic crawler crane is operating at an altitude of almost 5,000m in the Peruvian Andes.

The 220t LTR 1220, which Liebherr claims is the first crane of this type in Latin America, has been working at the Antamina copper-zinc mine, Mining equipment specialist Joy Global Peru SAC has the crane on long term hire from crane owner Gruas Alquileres SA.

The unit has been working in difficult conditions, including extreme temperature fluctuations. Its main work is unloading the components of two electrical mining excavators and assembling them, The mine is one of the ten largest in the world, with 24/7 operations and around 430,000 tonnes of material extracted every day.

CRC in underwater crane rescue

A Manitowoc crane that slipped off a bank into 70ft of water has been successfully rescued by Florida-based Crane Rental Corporation (CRC) in a tandem lift.

CRC used a Manitowoc 2250 crawler crane with MAX-ER attachment (500t capacity) and a 600t Terex AC 500-2 hydraulic truck crane to lift the submerged Manitowoc 4600 dragline. The total weight lifted was 484,000 pounds.

CRC had to supply pre-lift plans and submit them to the Mining Safety and Health Administration for approval. It also supplied a lift director, skilled riggers and certified crane operators for the job.

The company has performed nearly a dozen recoveries after similar accidents and has engineered specialised rigging for such projects.

Engineers assessed the machine and had to predict the components’ stored energy before divers cut the boom, mast and heavy-duty wire rope. Underwater cameras and communications were essential as the divers’ exposure had to be limited at the depth.