Lindø Industrial Park saves time and manpower by replacing heavy polyester slings with lightweight Dynamica SafeLift slings manufactured in Dyneema®.
The industrial park on Funen has a great experience with the handling and shipping of large components for the offshore and heavy industry. The industrial zone in Odense is, amongst other things, a collection point and a storage depot for jackets for offshore wind turbine foundations. Jackets are 63m tall steel structures with a weight of up to 665t per piece. This figure corresponds to the weight of 27 fully loaded lorries!
A gantry crane with a capacity of 1,000 t is used several times, both to gather the jackets and then to move them around for storage or shipping. The process involves lifting of so-called 3D structures, which have a height of 55m and a weight of approx. 500t per piece, where rigging needs to be done at a height of some 50 or 60m.
A lifting sling is lowered down along the foot of a jacket, pulled underneath two stiffs, and then guided back up to the beam. Lindø Industrial Park has used polyester slings for this type of lifting until very recently. In this case a standard polyester sling had a diameter of 101mm and weighed 186kg.
However, polyester has now been replaced with hi-tech lifting slings manufactured by Dynamica Ropes. More specifically, these 40mm Dynamica SafeLift slings only weigh 45kg per piece. A weight reduction of at least 140kg compared to a polyester sling.
Peter Blazejewicz, Transport Engineering Manager at Lindø Industrial Park, says: ‘The weight reduction means that we save at least 45 minutes on each lifting operation. Since each lift involves a 1,000t portal crane, a 103m truck-mounted lift and normally seven employees, the time savings are undoubtedly substantial.’
Time is saved primarily because the switch to the light slings has made it possible to reach all four rigging points without moving the gigantic 103m truck-mounted lift around. As the polyester slings were substantially heavier, the truck-mounted lift’s capacity could not reach the four rigging points from one place, and the lift therefore had to be moved at least once, with corresponding rigging and de-rigging.
Peter Blazejewicz continues: ‘We naturally examine both the theoretical properties and actual physical condition of new lifting gear before we use it – and we were very impressed by the properties offered by Dynamica Ropes’ lifting slings. After a meticulous deliberation of the lifting task at hand with Enes Hadziefendic, Technical Consultant at Dynamica Ropes, we decided to buy SafeLift slings, and this has turned out to be a great decision.’
