Heavy shipments in the Alps
Across and through the mountains. Friderici Spécial, a Swiss heavylift specialist from the canton of Vaud, carried out two major projects in the Alps in the first three months this year. A customised solution was provided in Valais, its SPMTs were deployed in Switzerland for the first time.
At the beginning of this year Friderici Spécial was commissioned to transport and install large components for a project to modernise the Gabi hydroelectric power plant near the Simplon Pass.
In order to get to the power plant at all, a truck first had to drive backwards for 600 m. At the destination there was very little space between the vehicle, the 35 t transformer and the sheer rock face.
In a second operation the company transported two generators, each weighing approximately 60 t. Their height of 3.4 m required the deployment of low-loaders.
They had to be transferred by crane to a more compact modular trailer with greater ground clearance for the last kilometre, over which they again had to be transported backwards by the truck.
The huge drill head on an SPMT
In March then, Friderici began dismantling and removing a tunnel boring machine that had bored the relief tunnel of the Sarneraatal flood protection system.
The firm deployed its SPMTs for the first time in Switzerland, to shift each individual part out of the tunnel, including the drill head, which weighed 88 t and had a diameter of 6.5 m.