Hofmann’s new LR 1800-1.0 erects 5.7 MW turbines in the Eifel

A disused radio station, two 5.7 MW turbines

A military radio station abandoned more than 20 years ago in the Bitburg-Prüm district has become the site of two Nordex N163/5.7 wind turbines. With a rotor diameter of 163 metres and a hub height of 160 metres, the pair are expected to supply several thousand households. Crane company Hofmann of Paderborn, part of the Bracht Group, handled the lifts; Nordex site manager Frank Stanitzek and his team completed the erection in two weeks at the end of May 2024.

The crane was new. Bought specifically for wind power and large-scale assembly work, Hofmann’s LR 1800-1.0 lattice boom crawler was transported directly from the Liebherr plant in Ehingen to Prüm in April 2024 and rigged there for the first time with Liebherr fitters present.

HSL4: the tall configuration

The machine was set up in the HSL4 boom system with a 165-metre main boom and a 12-metre lattice fixed jib. HSL4 is currently the most powerful arrangement available for the LR 1800-1.0 in wind work; taken to its limit with a 174-metre main mast and a 21-metre fixed jib it will handle turbines with hub heights up to 179 metres. The crane offers up to 800 tonnes of lifting capacity and hook heights above 200 metres.

For each turbine the crew lifted a 68-tonne nacelle, a 74-tonne drive train and a 63-tonne hub at a radius of around 28 metres. The tower sections, at 76, 73 and 51 tonnes, were the straightforward part of the programme.

Ballast for the job ran to 170 tonnes on the slewing platform, 70 tonnes in the undercarriage and 400 tonnes of suspended ballast. That full complement is only needed to raise the boom; once erected, the crane worked with a modest amount of ballast on the VarioTray. Power comes from a 455 kW Liebherr diesel.

“I was previously on the LR 1700-1.0 and can say that Liebherr crawler cranes are generally simple and easy to operate. In particular, the monitors embedded in the armrests for monitoring the winches really make the work easier.”

— Valerij Ren, crane operator, Hofmann

Dismantle, move 300 metres, rebuild

Between the two turbines the whole machine had to come down and go back up 300 metres away, inside a week.

“We have to completely dismantle the LR 1800-1.0 within a week and reassemble it near the second system in Prüm, 300 metres from our current location. This can be done with six people and a 100-tonne auxiliary crane. The new Liebherr crawler crane is extremely easy to assemble.”

— Valerij Ren, crane operator, Hofmann

The heaviest single components are the two 60-tonne crawler carriers, and the slewing platform connects to the centre section of the chassis via Quick Connection. In the configuration described the system weighs around 900 tonnes and travels on roughly 60 low-loaders – a figure kept down by the six and twelve-metre boom, luffing jib and fixed jib segments, which nest inside one another three deep for transport. Next stop for the crane is northern Germany and the following generation of Nordex turbines at 179 metres hub height. According to Hofmann head of operations Dieter Abt, it will not be seeing Paderborn again for years.

Source: Liebherr — Photos: Liebherr