Helicopter assembly of a tower crane at 2,300 metres.
Sleet in May, a tight schedule and a construction site that could not be reached by vehicle: extraordinary conditions even for our experienced crane professionals when assembling a tower crane at 2,300 metres by helicopter.
The ingenious crane solution and the great performance of our service engineers – here in the video and job report showing the helicopter assembly:
The ingenious crane solution and the great performance of our service engineers – here in the video and job report showing the helicopter assembly:
The mountain is calling.
A new mountain station is to be built in Ischgl, Austria, by the winter season. This requires: A tower crane for the necessary lifting work. Therefore, the team from BKL Munich had a limited timeframe in which to provide the right top-slewing crane, as rising temperatures would soon make it impossible to use a helicopter. The helicopter flights were affected not only by the weather conditions, the load capacity was also limited to just 3.2 tonnes due to the altitude.
Matching crane and smart planning.
With the tower crane TLS 60 14, BKL has the best-fit solution in its rental fleet: powerful yet modular and light enough to be airlifted to the site by helicopter. To transport the crane parts to the place of departure, our crane logistic specialists used several trucks with shortened trailers to safely navigate the narrow mountain roads. After arriving the team prepared the crane components, ready to be quickly attached and flown by helicopter to the construction site the following day.To achieve this, the crane experts came up with unconventional solutions right from the planning phase: they deliberately configured the crane without a cabin and removed other non-essential components to save weight and helicopter hours. They also weighed and marked each component in advance to ensure a smooth process for the helicopter assembly.
At the construction site, the service engineers secured the crossbase on a pre-concreted surface so that the crane could operate without heavy base ballast. To enable the tower sections to be flown in closely timed sets, they were first set up and partially bolted together. The final bolting was done in the flight breaks.
BKL crane:
Top-slewing crane BKL TLS 60 14
Efficiently assembled with only 15 flights.
Despite the weather conditions and a flight break of several hours due to dense fog, our experienced team managed to assemble the crane by helicopter within one day and with only 15 flights, thus fulfilling the specifications of the customer, Silvrettaseilbahn AG.Thanks to the well thought-out project planning, optimum preparation and experienced execution, the top-slewing crane with a radius of 25 metres and a hook height of around 21 metres is ready for the lifting work to build the new cable car station for the next ski season in the well-known winter sports region.
Source (photos and videos): BKL / Roman Nöstler. In cooperation with our Spanish partner Sáez Cranes [external link].
The matching tower crane comes from the BKL Sáez system.
Thanks to its modular design, the TLS 60 14 is suitable for the helicopter transport and is ready for the lifting work in Ischgl with this configuration:- 20.80 metre hook height
- 25.00 metre radius
- 5.5 tonnes peak load
- 6.0 tonnes maximum load capacity.
And we have even more cranes: in the BKL System Sáez you will find powerful top-slewing cranes up to 1,100 tonne-metres, space-saving luffing jib cranes and Industry 4.0-capable bottom-slewing cranes. BKL System Sáez
The customised crane solution for your project?
In our rental fleet of over 700 cranes, you will find more than 500 construction cranes from 13 to 1,100 tonne-metres, over 130 mobile cranes up to 700 tonnes and 152 metres hook height as well as more than 30 mobile construction cranes for your requirements. Moreover, BKL provides you with comprehensive advice and numerous services from a single source.
By the way: Read more about other great projects in which our rental cranes were used here.