Solidlink quick coupling turns Y-guying assembly into a one-person job
Montagrues put its new Liebherr LTM 1400-6.1 to work dismantling an 80-metre tower crane in Paris, on a cramped footprint and against the clock. The talking point was the self-assembly of the Y-guying system, rigged in less than an hour at the first attempt.
First job, tight site, tight schedule
The brand-new 400-tonne LTM 1400-6.1 arrived at the Paris site before daybreak. Once it had been positioned on a very limited footprint, set-up began under the supervision of a Liebherr service technician: self-assembly of the ballast frames and all counterweights, then the Y-guying system.
The crane lifted the complete Y-guying assembly off the low-loader and set it on its own undercarriage. Luffing the boom then brought the hydraulic quick coupling into automatic engagement with the telescopic boom; bolting followed hydraulically, controlled by the crane operator. Only the electrical connection had to be made by hand.
Solidlink, borrowed from earthmoving
The mechanism behind this is Solidlink, the fully automatic quick coupling system Liebherr has used for years in its earthmoving range to change attachments. On the LTM 1400-6.1 it is applied for the first time to connect the Y-guying system to the telescopic boom.
From crane in position to 90 tonnes of ballast placed and the Y-guying ready for use took the operator and set-up crew around two hours in total. An LTM 1060-3.1 then rigged the lattice jib.
“The new way of assembling the complete Y-guying system, which we call Superlift, really saves us an enormous amount of time. And speed is the decisive factor on our construction sites here in Paris. The Superlift was installed in less than an hour – and that was the very first time it was set up.”
— Daniel Pereira, managing director, Montagrues
Taking down a 75-metre hook height
The job itself was the dismantling of a large Liebherr top-slewing crane with a hook height of 75 metres – a crane Montagrues had erected around a year earlier with its LTM 1450-8.1. With that machine unavailable, the new LTM 1400-6.1 went in with Superlift and a 17.5-metre fixed jib.
Responsibility for taking the tower crane apart lay with Daniel Correia and his team at STME Grues, a specialist in large tower crane assembly with around 25 employees and two sites south of Paris. “We have to make do with a very small footprint for the crane here, but the LTM 1400-6.1 can still be used brilliantly,” he says. STME’s own largest mobile crane, an LTM 1300-6.2, was too small for the work, which is why the two companies teamed up.
Both firms run Liebherr exclusively. Montagrues operates around 40 machines from 30-tonne cranes upwards, plus tractor units and some 30 trailers, and has worked with Liebherr for roughly 40 years. Jib length, Pereira notes, is what matters most on Paris sites.
Source: Liebherr — Photos: Liebherr