Largest Crane in Scandinavia Makes Quick Work of Railway Bridge Project

Enlarge Image A Terex Demag CC6800 lattice-boom works on a bridge project south of Stockholm, Sweden.

September 9, 2008 • A marshy riverbank, little space and even less time combined to make a special challenge for the Nordic heavy-lift contractor Havator and its Terex Demag CC6800 crane. The task of replacing a railway bridge over the Nyköpingsån River, almost 75 miles south of Stockholm, required ensuring that use of the railway could recommence as quickly as possible. In normal circumstances the line would need to be closed for more than a month, but use of the Terex Demag CC6800 lattice-boom crane with an almost 1,377-ton lifting capacity reduced the period to less than a week.

Havator purchased the Terex Demag CC6800 with an almost 315-foot main boom, 354-foot luffing fly jib, Superlift and a modular hook block system with a multitude of possible variations.

 

Lifting out the old 220-ton bridge was an easy job • a warm-up, one might say, compared with what Havator's self-propelled modular trailers (SPMT) brought along the narrow access road in the grey dawn: the new bridge with a live weight of 352 tons. The contract specified that the new bridge had to be lifted off the flatbed trailers at noon on Aug. 11. Thanks to extensive preparations and the professional Havator team, the bridge was lifted two hours ahead of time.

Enlarge Image The new bridge had a weight of 352 tons.

The crane was configured with a 196-foot main boom and Superlift with 441-ton Superlift counterweight. The Superlift radius was almost 79 feet; the stabilizer base measured a compact 46 x 46 feet. The bridge had to be set in place exactly on a load radius of almost 120 feet; it was rigged to the hook with a system of spreaders bars. With this configuration and radius, the maximum lifting capacity is 404 tons.

 

Crane operator Krister Enarsson carried out his first lift with the new crane with great skill, since he already has experience with other Terex Demag lattice-boom cranes. Havator operates, among others, a Terex Demag CC2200, a Terex Demag TC2800-1 and several Terex Demag CC2800-1s. These utilize the same operating principle. “The operation of the new large crane is as easy and intuitive as our smaller machines,” said Enarsson. “It is a big advantage that Terex Demag uses the same IC-1 crane control system in all its crawler cranes.”

 

Havator is expanding the large crane business with Terex. Erkki Hanhirova, owner and chair of Havator's supervisory board, said: “We will continue to invest in large cranes from Terex in order to further expand our position as a leading heavy lift contractor in our market area. With the new Terex Demag CC 6800 we offer our clients the most powerful crawler crane in Scandinavia.”

 

The Terex Demag CC6800 has a 1,377-ton lattice boom crawler crane with a maximum load moment of 13,952 metre-tonne is designed for industrial use all over the world. Its components, with a maximum transport width of almost 10 feet or 11.48 feet and low transport weights of 16.5 to 55 tons, are economical to transport anywhere in the world. Its strengths are particularly evident in the construction of petrochemical plants and power stations:  they include easy assembly and fast setup times, variable main boom offsets for SW and SWSL, Quadro crawler drive and hydraulic pinning for boom sections as standard. The variable Superlift with a radius adjustable from 49 to 78 feet extends the maneuverability of the crane on jobsites and enables it to also work in confined spaces.

 

Havator Group offers lifting services, special transports, installation of prefabricated elements and harbor crane services. Havator Group operates in Finland, Sweden, Norway, Russia and in the Baltic countries.