The construction of the new Wembley Stadium in London has been in the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Delays, strikes and other setbacks have plagued the development of one of the world’s most famous sporting arenas.

Wembley was originally meant to host the FA Cup final on 13 May this year, but the Football Association confirmed only recently another delay in the project after revealing all matches planned for 2006 will be moved to other venues.

However, just up the road at the railway station, Poole, UK-based engineering firm Modulift Design & Consultancy (MDC) was far more organised as it played a key role in the construction of the White Horse Bridge – part of the Wembley Stadium development.

Four giant arches, weighing a combined 420t were lifted into place, with help from the Modulift spreader system.

Working in conjunction with MSD Darlington Ltd, Cleveland Bridge and Abnormal Load Engineering (ALE), MDC supplied a modular crane spreader system, with beam sections of varying lengths to be combined for different lifting tasks, which ensured the giant white arches of the bridge could be lifted into place without incident.

Cleveland Bridge was contracted to produce the bridge and the contract lift of the arches was let to MSD Darlington Ltd who also undertook all the site assembly and welding of the bridge arches.

ALE was contracted to supply its Gottawold AK912 crane for the main lifting role, which was rigged with a 77m main boom, 44m super-lift derrick, 120t main ballast and 400t super-lift ballast. Other cranes on site for auxiliary duties were Terex Demag models AC100, AC300 and AC60.

For the load handling, the four arches weighed between 120 and 156t and required spreader lengths of 15m, 29.8m and 30.6m, each with eccentric centre of gravity. The four spreaders were made from a single Modulift spreader set.

Nick Latham, MDC director explains the simplicity of the Modulift system. He says: “Modulift is a range of unique modular spreader beams that are made up of several components bolted together to make a single beam of any size.”

He adds: “This enables safe, efficient and cost effective load handling for any lifting job across all industry applications. The use of Modulift on the White Horse lifting job reflects its growing popularity in the lifting business.”

MDC provided full project support and consultation for the White Horse lift, ensuring the smooth running of lifting operations with the Modulift spreader system supplied.

Due to the exacting lengths of spreader beam required, MDC produced separate rig drawings for every lift enabling the customers to fully integrate the spreader beams into the process during the early planning stages.

The final solution for the lift consisted of one set of spreader beams (as opposed to a separate spreader for each job), with modular components that were used to quickly and efficiently build each different spreader configuration for the four lifting tasks.

“In the case of the White Horse lift,” continues Latham, “which required beam sections of exact lengths to match up with specific lifting points on the arches, we were able to provide a selection of modules and shackles as one package.”

He adds, the 15m spreaders became part of the larger spreaders and MDC were even able to provide a special short section to change from the 29.8m to 30.6m spreader.

“Being able to safely bolt together the different beam sections and shackles greatly speeds up a multiple lift operation,” Latham adds.

A Modulift spreader comprises three main components: end units, struts and drop links. End units are attached at each end of a strut with bolted joints. The drop links feature two holes and are attached to each end unit using shackles which are also attached to the slings that support the spreader, and are attached at their top end to the hook of a crane.

Two further shackles join more slings under the spreader, which provide support to the load, to the lower hole in the drop link.

The Modulift range comprises 15 systems, which provide lifting capacity for weights between 2 and 3,000t and lengths from 200mm to 53m.