March 8 - Kahl Schwerlast has used its 600-tonne capacity Goldhofer high girder bridge to move two 475-tonne transformers from the Mönchengladbach district of Rheydt to a substation at Dörpen in Lower Saxony, Germany.
Built by General Electric at the former Alstom facility in Mönchengladbach, each transformer was first placed on a 20-axle heavy-duty trailer and transported 12 km from Rheydt to Kleinenbroich, where a 720-tonne capacity hydraulic lift system was used to raise the units into the girder bridge.
The main challenge Kahl Schwerlast encountered on the journey was the 7.8 km section between the Korschenbroich district of Kleinenbroich and Kaarst, which involved crossing five bridges, each of which had weight limits of 20 tonnes per axle line, explained Goldhofer.
"To satisfy a condition imposed by the highway authority, a complex bridge monitoring system was employed using sensors from the TUV supervisory authority," explained André Krause of Kahl Schwerlast, who was responsible for the project execution.
"That ensured that no damage was caused by the loads imposed on crossing the bridges. Four of the five bridges could be crossed without the need for any temporary bridge structures."
On arrival at Kaarst, the transformers, each of which measured 14.36 m x 5.26 m x 5.56 m, were moved back onto the 20-axle trailer using a second hydraulic lift system. From here, the transformers were delivered to Düsseldorf-Lörick and loaded onto barges for shipment along the River Rhine to Dörpen.
