The 40 tonne outrigger crane for the blast furnace at the former Redcar steel plant has now been delivered by the Industrial Crane Division of Konecranes UK. It was ordered by Sahaviriya Steel Industries (SSI), the Thai firm that bought the former Redcar steel plant.
The blast furnace at Redcar is the second largest blast furnace in Europe and is linked to a modern steel making facility, which has an annual steel slab production capacity of 3.5 million tonnes. The Konecrane outrigger crane has a span of 12 metres has 61 metres of lifting height. The crane is fitted with KONECRANES renowned technology components including KONECRANES DynA Invertor variable speed control on all motions with the added feature of ESR (Extended Speed Range) on the hoist and DynAC closed loop inverter variable speed control systems on the cross and long travel. It is radio controlled and the electrics are suitable for the environmental conditions to be found near the sea on top of a blast furnace. The crane has girder and trolley platforms, ramshorn hook, festoon cross crane cables, cross and long travel 2 step limit switches, hoist and lower limit switches, ultimate hoist limit switch and storm locks for crane and trolley.
As it will be operating in the open in all weathers, there will be additional rain covers on the motors and cubicles and there is also heating in the motors and panels. The crane is fitted withan anemometer to ensure the crane is not used in excessive wind speeds, double hoist brakes for added safety due to the crane location and it has Konecranes ControlPro condition monitoring.
The crane was erected with 500t mobile crane to reach the rail height of 64m. The mobile crane was equipped with a luffing fly jib to reach this height.