Mining engineering company FL Smidth (FLS) has decommissioned a 10-ton Condra portal crane in Mozambique to use in a company workshop in Ghana
Two new machines of similar design and capacity, recently completed by Condra Johannesburg, are to join it.
Separately, Condra has additionally shipped two portal cranes of 15-ton capacity to FLS Saudi Arabia.
The four newly-completed cranes were dispatched mid-August, fulfilling orders placed in March by FL Smidth’s Sub-Sahara and West Africa Procurement Service.
Installation and commissioning of the FLS cranes in Accra and Dammam is expected to take place late September.
Condra has a long-standing relationship with FLS, enjoying a reputation for reliable, robust machines efficiently serviced by maintenance crews pre-cleared to enter destination countries throughout Africa and the Middle East.
All three Ghana cranes, including the machine from Mozambique, will be used for maintenance.
They will run on end-carriages customised with spaced nylon-treaded wheels to meet an FLS stipulation that floor loading at the workshop not exceed 5,000kg.
The decommissioned Mozambique crane will have these end-carriages fitted upon arrival in Accra, matching it to the twin 10-ton portal machines.
At the tender stage, FL Smidth requested maximum floorspace and lifting height within the constraints of the Accra workshop building.
To achieve this, Condra used SH (short headroom) hoists from its Titan range, then mounted geared drives vertically on the end-carriages to achieve a floorspace saving of about half that required by conventional mounts.
Other features include digital loadcell hoist readouts, variable-speed drives on the long-travels, and pendant backup for hand-held remote control units.
The two 15-ton portal cranes for Saudi Arabia have a general configuration similar to the Ghanaian cranes, but will run on conventional steel wheels and rails.
They will be installed in the FLS workshop in Dammam, an industrialised port city in the east of the country on the Gulf.
The tight constraints imposed by limited workshop space on crane installation at Dammam posed a challenge during the design phase: box girders,15-ton hoists, girder legs and end-carriages had all to be capable of assembly and installation within a vertical plane measuring just 8.3 metres across by 5.4 metres high.
Short-headroom SH hoists from the Titan range also helped meet this challenge, Condra said in a statement.
“Features of the Saudi cranes are similar to those for Ghana, with the exception of two-speed drives throughout, there being no variable-speed drives on the Saudi cranes,” it noted.
Condra also used 3D modelling software to prepare all four cranes for packing, virtually presenting them on-screen to digitised standard containers.
Just two containers were needed for actual dispatch to each country.
Condra’s Titan SH hoists are designed to make maximum use of expensive factory space – headroom as well as floor – reducing the size of many constituent parts to take height out of the final crane assembly.
They incorporate refinements such as automatic rope tensioning, smoother travel, built-in load limiter, standardised direct drive and universal carriage.
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Cranes under manufacture at Condra’s Raceway Industrial Park factory, outside Johannesburg (Image source: Condra)
