Sarens puts big Demag to work in India

First, the Demag CC 8800-1 needed to be shipped from Greece to a port in Mumbai. After being offloaded from the boat it was transported to the job site using multiple trucks.

To aid with assembling the CC 8800-1, and to act as a tailing crane, Sarens also used a Demag CC 2800-1 lattice boom crawler. The team assembled the CC 8800-1 in seven days, despite facing space limitations.

At the time of writing, the heaviest lift the Demag CC 8800-1 had carried out was a 425 tonne urea reactor, which was 53 metres in length and 3.8 m in diameter. To perform the lift, the reactor was upended with the CC 8800-1 in an SSL 84/72 configuration at a lift radius of 24 m. The CC 2800-1 assist crane was used in an SSL 54 configuration. After lifting the reactor, the CC 8800-1 crane operator slowly slewed and walked the heavy load into position. The Demag CC 8800-1 crawler is also being used to execute five more key component erections.

Sarens was commissioned for the job by RFCL (Ramagundam Fertilizers and Chemicals) through the project’s EPC (engineering, procurement and construction) contractor, Bridge and Roof Company. In total, approximately US$750 million will be invested into the project when it is completed in late 2018 or early 2019. The plant will produce 1.12 million tonnes of urea annually.

“The Demag CC 8800-1 crawler crane is a highly versatile machine,” explained Navneet Jain, Sarens regional deputy director, Asia Pacific. “In addition to being a good fit for this project, we have several other jobs happening in India that the crane can be used for. So, we decided that transporting it here from Greece was a good choice.

“We are pleased with how smoothly the transportation process went with the Demag CC 8800-1 crawler crane. For a big crane, it’s relatively easy to transport and assemble, even in tight conditions.”