VIDEO: Tadano crawler lifts 500 tonnes

At a port in Marseille, France, Forme 10, one of the biggest dry docks in Europe, a Tadano CC 68.1250 1 lifted technical equipment onto the Saipem CastorOne, one of the world’s largest pipelaying ships.

“Not a single one of the employees at the site had ever seen such an enormous crane in the flesh before – which maybe isn’t that surprising, given that our CC 68.1250 1 is the biggest crane currently in use in France and Italy,” said Vernazza Autogru general director Paolo Delfino.

The crane had to replace the heavy pipelaying equipment on the ship with more powerful and efficient components.

This included lifting a DMA winch weighing 190 tonnes to a height of 30 meters at a radius of 30 meters onto the ship, as well as a total of six 200 tonne tensioners to a height of 40 meters at a radius of 50 meters.

Heaviest load

The heaviest load, however, was a 500 tonne pipeline winch with a five kilometre steel wire rope that had to be lifted to a height of five meters at a radius of 25 meters.

“These specifications really make it clear that only an extraordinarily powerful lattice boom crawler crane was going to be able to take care of the huge loads and large work radii. On top of that, we needed to account for the tight space conditions at the dock even with an installed Superlift system, so that our CC 68.1250 1 was the way to go,” said Delfino.

The fact that the Tadano crane’s track width nearly matched the rail spacing of the harbour crane at the dock turned out to be a crucial advantage, as it made it possible to position and move the CC 68.1250 1 on crane mats directly on the rails. “That was a very fortunate circumstance, as it made manoeuvring the crane much easier,” added Delfino.

The crane was configured with an 84 metre main boom and SSL with the complete superstructure and superlift counterweights, enabling it to take care of all lifts safely and as scheduled with a ramshorn hook for both light and heavy loads.

Vernazza Autogru’s Tadano CC 68.1250-1 lattice boom crawler crane working on the Saipem CastorOne pipelaying ship. Photo: Tadano