WORLD NEWS
Two Liebherr LTM 1500-8.1 mobile cranes dismantle 100-year-old bridge
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Ready for action – the two LTM 1500-8.1 cranes from Schares
and Flossdorf started the dismantling work on the old bridge
at sunrise.
2
Released – the flame cutters did their job admirably.
4
3
On the hooks – the crane operators carefully manoeuvred the
massive steel structure between the two booms.
Two Liebherr LTM 1500-8.1 mobile cranes
from crane and heavy haulage contractors
Autokrane Schares GmbH from Bocholt
and Dietmar Flossdorf GmbH from Bad
Neuenahr recently dismantled a 100-year-
old railway bridge in Essen. The two
500-tonne cranes had to lift 120 tonnes of
steel in a tandem hoist.
The steel bridge over a 4-lane road
has been part of Essen’s cityscape for
100 years. But the time had come for the
ailing structure to be removed for new
buildings. The great age of the bridge
proved to be a challenge for planning the
crane job, however, because there were
no reliable figures for the precise weight
of the structure.
8
SEPTEMBER 2019
On the ground – the mobile cranes have completed their
work. Then the flame cutters had to go back to work.
After detailed advanced planning by
external service executive Peter Voss,
and technical drawer Nicole Bröker, main
contractor Schares decided to use two
LTM 1500-8.1 cranes for the job,
as they provided plenty of lifting
capacity reserves. One of them came
from its own fleet based in Bocholt,
while the other was provided by
Flossdorf, based in Bad Neuenahr,
around 130km from Essen.
The cranes were prepared with
135 tonnes of ballast and their telescopic
booms were each extended to 31.7
metres. The bridge had to be hoisted
with a radius of up to 16 metres. It had
first been released from the abutments
by flame cutters. The heavy-duty cranes
hoisted the structure with ease. The crane
control systems showed that they were
sharing a weight of 120 tonnes. The LTM
1500-8.1 cranes had plenty of reserves
without having to install any telescopic
boom guying.
Crane operators Bernd Janssen
(Schares) and Thorsten Mahlberg
(Flossdorf) manoeuvred the bridge as
instructed by marshal Dominik Ussat
(Schares) carefully between the two
8-axle cranes and placed it on the
ground. Then it was time for the flame
cutters to go back to work. The steel
structure was removed once it had been
cut into small parts.
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