Demag duo’s desert debut

A 36km road and mega-bridge connection will link Kuwait City with the future Madinat al-Hareer (Silk City) and with Doha. The most spectacular element is the 27km bridge over Kuwait Bay. As part of this project the Kuwaiti logistics service provider Integrated Logistics Company (ILC) had to handle large pre-assembled concrete supports, weighing over 100t each, at a desert construction site near Sabiya. For this task, ILC relied on the powerful performance of its two new Demag AC 300-6 cranes – which celebrated a double premiere in the process.

ILC was not just using its new Demag AC 300-6 all-terrain cranes for the first time; these were also the first Demag cranes of this type delivered by the German plant in Zweibrücken to an international customer anywhere in the world.

"In addition to quick rigging, the AC 300-6 impressed us with its lifting capacities, which are unmatched in its class, and especially the 80m main boom, which we used to install the small section of the precast beam. Because of its compact design, this crane can be used in many different scenarios," said ILC CEO, Saleh Alhuwaidi.

The two Demag AC 300-6 cranes saw their initial deployment on the desert construction site. Their job there was to lift precast concrete components from a hydraulic dolly-type trailer and place them at their pre-planned position. Because the steel-reinforced concrete elements weighed 105t each, were approximately 37 m long, one meter wide, and 2.3 m tall, the work was best done with a tandem lift.

Before the lifting could be done, the two cranes had to be brought to the construction site. "The 130km drive through the desert went very smoothly," reported Alhuwaidi. The cranes were accompanied by four tractor-trailer rigs, which among other things transported the required counterweight of approximately 50t. The crane operators needed just two hours with the help of two riggers apiece to set up the cranes. "The assembly-friendly design was also decisive for the use of our two Demag AC 300-6 cranes on this construction site, since the quick setup was crucial to adhere to the tight time constraints ," explains Alhuwaidi.

For the tandem lift the cranes were fitted with 24.4m meter-long main booms, a counterweight of 26.7t, and an 80t hook block with seven-part reeving. An outrigger support base of 8.7m x 8.5m meters provided the required stability. Rigged this way, the cranes were prepared to lift the two 105t concrete beams from their lowbed trailer in a two-step tandem lift, swivel them sideways at a radius of nine meters, and lower them at the specified place in the desert sand. Thanks to the cranes' quick working speed, their exceptional maneuverability, and their fast setup, even with a minimal crew the ILC team was able to complete the job in just one day.