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Volvo olvo Pipelayers Pipelayers at
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work work in in Germany
Germany
Ten of the innovative Volvo PL4611
pipelayers are being used on the major
Bunde-Etzel gas pipeline project in
Northern Germany. The machines are
being deployed by the Italian main
contractor Ghizzoni SpA which has a 60
million Euro contract to complete the
pipeline for Bunde Etzel Pipeline (BEP) by
mid 2011.
The 60km long Bunde-Etzel pipeline will
run between a cavern storage facility at
Etzel and the gas pipeline hub at Bunde –
situated on the German-Dutch border. IVG
Caverns GmbH, which operates caverns Two of the Volvo PL4611 pipelayers being used to lift a section of the 1200mm
for both crude oil and gas in Etzel, is
diameter pipe on the Bunde-Etzel gas pipeline project in Northern Germany.
expanding its storage facilities and the new
1200mm diameter pipeline is needed to deal with the increasing demand for gas.
Ghizzoni has been operating in the pipeline industry for 60 years and has extensive experience of constructing and
laying cross-country pipelines for oil, gas and water transportation. On this gas pipeline job it is using 10 Volvo
EC290BNLC crawler excavators to help dig the trench. The Volvo pipelayers are then used to feed sections of the gas
pipe into the trench.
The pipelayers have been used in groups operating in as many as four different areas consecutively. Alternatively
they can all be used in one line. Marco Scazzina, the Construction Leader at Ghizzoni, says, “We can lower a 1km
long pipe in one go using 10 pipelayers at the same time.”
Whilst conventional pipelayers utilise hinged booms fixed to the sides of crawler tractors (side-booms), the Volvo
PL4611s carry their booms on the front of Volvo EC460C tracked hydraulic excavator superstructures. This design
configuration provides the PL4611 with 360° rotation and increases operational versatility because the pipelayer boom
can be interchanged with standard backhoe digging equipment.
The 9.2m boom on the PL4611 is longer than a conventional side-boom pipelayer that means the Volvo can
operate more safely further back from the edge of the trench. “In very wet conditions, the risk of slippage is
considerable, if not inevitable, when conventional side-boom pipelayers are required to work close to the trench,” says
Marco Scazzina.
Complete with a Load Management System, the PL4611 on its 5.5m wide tracked undercarriage has a tipping load
rating of 113 tonnes (depending on the terrain). The boom has a three-stage light indicator system situated at its end,
which shows when the machine reaches its load capacity.
Paul Johnson, Key Customer Business Development for Volvo Construction Equipment Europe, says the Ghizzoni
project shows how Volvo is expanding into the oil and gas segment. “Despite the recession, the pipeline segment has
more than doubled in recent years and there has never been a better time for Volvo to become more involved in this
growing market.”
Terex erex tandem tandem lift lift in in Bavaria
Bavaria
Page 14
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Volvo Construction Equipment
Two Terex mobile cranes – a 100 tonne capacity AC100/4 and a 55 tonne capacity AC55 City – were recently used by
Kran Saller GmbH to help replace two large truck scales. Each weighing 43 tonnes, the old scales had to be carefully
removed in extremely tight working conditions at a waste management company’s facilities in the Bavarian town of
Passau, Germany.
The most difficult part of this job was a tandem lift that had to be partially performed under a projecting roof with a
height of only 5.0m. To further complicate the lifting operation, the area immediately surrounding the truck scales had
a maximum width of approximately 4m.
By selecting the compact AC55 City crane, the Kran Saller team was able make use of its ability to telescope its
boom with a load even when the boom is horizontal. Using the AC55 City in this way, it was able to lift and manoeuvre
the end of the scale under the low roof. The other end of each scale was handled by the AC100/4 which operated
CP&E Contractors Plant & Equipment Vol 1 No 6