All-rounder: double girder bridge crane with slewing trolleys

KULI - Hebezeuge, Helmut Kempkes GmbH manufactures electric wire rope hoists with a lifting capacity of one to 200 tons. These electric wire rope hoists are used in a wide variety of crane and conveyor systems. Complete single and double girder cranes, suspension cranes, bracket cranes and gantry cranes are also produced. The supply of additional components such as magnet systems, grabs and vacuum devices round off the company's range. The Remscheid-based company also supplies electric chain hoists for loads of up to 5 tons. The latter are mainly used for maintenance purposes within industrial companies or in the trades. A particular specialty is the manufacture, delivery and assembly of bridge and gantry cranes with slewing trolleys. These are manufactured as double-girder cranes with girder lengths of up to around 70 meters.

The overhead crane referred to in this case study has a total load capacity of 16 tons and is used by the customer to handle, among other things, construction steel mesh and reinforcement cages with a length of up to 25 meters. The overhead crane is used to handle the aforementioned materials on a newly constructed external crane runway with a total length of 73 meters and a span of 40 meters.

Everything from a single source and everything from Remscheid

Details of the KULI crane, which has been in service since mid-February. Photo: KULI Hebezeuge

All components were manufactured in production at the two plants in Remscheid. This included, in particular, the steel construction, the control system construction, the installation of the electrics, the manufacture of the electric wire rope hoists and trolleys. Components such as the motors, gearboxes and rope drums come from a modular system. The individual parts are kept in stock and assembled as required for the respective application. This procedure offers the user the decisive advantage of being able to count on the shortest possible delivery times, even for spare parts.

The special feature of this crane is that two slewing trolleys, each with two hoist units, are used with a lifting capacity of 4 tons each. These hoist units can be controlled individually, jointly for each trolley or jointly for both trolleys. A wide variety of transport tasks can therefore be carried out, either with a mat grab or with the hooks operating individually, and the materials can be optimally positioned with an overall rotation angle of 240°.

The requirements for this transport task were analyzed together with the customer with the aim of being able to use a specially adapted crane to transport the materials quickly and safely. Another point was the equipment in terms of operability and maintenance.

Travel speeds of up to 32 m/min in trolley travel and up to 63 m/min in crane travel

Details of the KULI crane, which has been in service since mid-February. Photo: KULI Hebezeuge

The crane was equipped with frequency inverters in the crane and trolley travel as well as in the slewing gear. This enables smooth and rapid transportation of the suspended load. The travel speeds were set at up to 32 m/min for trolley travel and up to 63 m/min for crane travel, depending on the product. All functions can be carried out precisely using a radio remote control with three master switches in belly-mounted mode and 12 additional functional selection options. A second installed complete spare radio control system ensures high availability.

The crane has a maintenance walkway along one of the 40-metre-long girders as well as fully accessible slewing trolleys. The switch cabinets with air conditioning are installed on the catwalk and on the slewing trolleys for easy access and servicing.

On February 13, KULI Hebezeuge sent the giant on its way, as described at the beginning of the article. The two trolley girders, each 40 meters long, and the two slewing trolleys with an excess width of 4.5 meters reached a total transport length of 110 meters. In the meantime, the assembly was completed by our KULI service personnel and the crane was released for operation on schedule after the test expert approval.

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