Nine axles, 4,000 tonnes: SANY’s largest all-terrain makes its inaugural lift in the mountains of Gansu
SANY’s SAC40000T, a nine-axle 4,000-tonne all-terrain crane, has completed its first working lift on a 200 MW wind farm in Gansu, installing a 6.25 MW turbine on a 120-metre hub-height tower.
The job
The crane, now owned by Zhejiang Hesheng Hoisting, carried out its inaugural lift at the 200,000 kW wind power project in Pingchuan, Baiyin, in Gansu Province, in November 2023. The task was the installation of a 6.25 MW turbine with a hub height of 120 metres. The nacelle alone weighed 150 tonnes; with rigging the gross load came to 180 tonnes.
That load is well inside the SAC40000T’s capacity. The reason the machine was chosen had more to do with getting it to the tower at all. The site sits in mountainous country with steep gradients and tight bends, and the tower centre stood just 40 metres from a cliff edge, leaving the crane very little room to slew and set up.
“With its lifting capacity and flexibility, this crane is ideal for this complex site.”
— Du Weihui, project manager
Rigging and travel times
The superlift system was assembled in about an hour. Equipment manager Zhang Jie noted that this was the team’s first attempt and expected the time to drop below an hour with practice.
For the move onto the pad the crane travelled with its outriggers, the first two boom sections and the telescopic cylinder still carried, covering 2.5 kilometres of continuous S-bends on gradients of up to 30 per cent. Being able to travel in that configuration cut out a large part of the disassembly and reassembly work that normally eats into a mountain wind job.
Cycle times on the tower were short: the fifth tower section was hoisted in 14 minutes and the nacelle set in 19 minutes.
Operator verdict
“The nine-axle crane with large booms is flexible, especially in such mountainous areas. Even in such a limited workspace, the crane was assembled in just four hours. Its user-friendly design saves substantial assembly time, especially its the superlift assembly which took only an hour for two superlift to assemble.”
— Sun Lei, general manager, Zhejiang Hesheng Hoisting
Wind installation in western China has become the proving ground for the largest wheeled cranes, precisely because road access, not load, is usually the limiting factor.
Source: Sany — Photos: Sany
Crane facts
- Crane: SANY SAC40000T all-terrain
- Capacity: 4,000 t, nine axles
- Owner: Zhejiang Hesheng Hoisting
- Project: 200 MW wind farm, Pingchuan, Baiyin, Gansu
- Turbine: 6.25 MW, 120 m hub height
- Nacelle weight: 150 t (180 t with rigging)
- Superlift assembly: approx. 1 hour
- Nacelle installation: 19 minutes