Condor Long Reach - Snijder BV

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Special adaptations

Record-breaking reach The Port of Rotterdam is home to a highly-unusual Caterpillar 385 that supports a long-reach boom and dipper stick that extend to a record-breaking 46 metres.

Steven Vale discovers it really does justify its nickname as the Condor. ransport containers have changed the world, providing an affordable way to shift goods. It is estimated that it costs just a €1 to ship a pair of trainers from China to Europe – less than 1% of the retail price. Not surprisingly, the volumes continue to grow and if the 10 million containers shipped to Europe from China each year were stacked end to end they would encircle the globe over oneand-a-half times!

Many of the containers end up at the Port of Rotterdam. While this popular arrival point still enjoys the envious position of Europe’s largest port, until 2003 it was the world’s largest port – a position it enjoyed for the previous 40 years.

The reason for the drop in ranking is simple – the port has reached its limits.

Drastic action is needed to ensure it does not slip further down the rankings behind Shanghai, Ningbo and Singapore. So the Port of Rotterdam has embarked on a massive expansion programme that when complete will boost port facilities by 20% and provide the capacity to handle an extra 17 million containers a year.

Not only are container volumes increasing, container vessels also continue to increase in size. When complete, the Second Maasvlakte project, or MV2 as it is known locally, will provide sufficient deepwater terminals to allow 25 giant 400m-long vessels to dock and unload their contents all at the same time.

However, there is still much to do and the largest earthmoving project in the country has already seen over 200 million cubic metres of sand being sucked up

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The Condor has an unbelievably long reach of over 46 metres and is currently being used for underwater surveys at an extension to the Port of Rotterdam.

mainly from the bottom of the North Sea and pumped ashore since 2008 to create the necessary new land. With an additional 165 million cubic metres still to go between now and 2033, when complete Holland will increase in size by 2000 hectares – roughly the same size as Disneyland Paris or Amsterdam Schiphol airport.

The volumes of sand needed to create this extra land are staggering and difficult to quantify. An information board at the FutureLand visitor centre sums it up as the following: it is the equivalent to the country’s 16 million inhabitants each bringing 265 wheelbarrows full of sand and dumping it on to a huge heap!

With the new land area already shaped, the large fleet of floating trailing suction dredgers have all gone, with the exception of a single vessel. They have been replaced by scores of road trucks bringing the phenomenal volumes of concrete needed to make the quay walls on the newly-created land.

Elsewhere, the hard sea wall, which requires a staggering seven million tonnes of material, is also quickly taking shape, absorbing a large chunk of the estimated current MV2 costs of around a million euros a day!

With tens of thousands of tonnes of stone continuing to arrive from quarries in Scandinavia each week, the site itself not only resembles a large quarry, but is also the playground for scores of large excavators and dump trucks.

Heading the pack by a long way is the Blockbuster, a machine featured in a recent issue of this magazine. Lifting massive 45-tonne concrete blocks with apparent ease, this mighty crane has no problem reaching out to 50m and then positioning them with precision at depth.

The gentle giant is progressing well and over half of the estimated 24,000 blocks are already in place along the new 3.5km hard sea wall. At the current rate of 100 metres a week, they are on target to complete the task early in 2012.

However, while this industry-leading machine continues to enjoy the limelight, there are plenty of other attractions at MV2. They include a pair of modified Hitachi EX1200s, one of which weighs nearly 145 tonnes. We plan to feature both in a forthcoming issue.

SITE VISIT This month the attention is on the Condor – a monstrous machine that towers above the horizon. Based on a four-year-old and heavilymodified Cat 385, it is the result of work by well-known Dutch earthmoving contractor Snijder, which made the one-of-a-kind machine for PUMA (Project Organisation for the Expansion of the Maasvlakte) – a joint undertaking from Boskalis and Van Oord, the two major partners that head MV2.

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The 110-tonne result has to be seen to be believed. With the 27-metre boom and 25-metre stick extended, the machine reaches to a mind-boggling 46.5 metres!

All that extra overhang up front meant Snijder engineers had to do a lot of work to beef up an already hefty excavator. Extra stability was created by turning the undercarriage through 90 degrees, which extends the outer track width to 6.5 metres.

Then over eight tonnes of weight was added to the beams – again to increase stability – while at the rear the excavator has an additional 7.6 tonnes of ballast.

Above (Three Pictures): Operator John Simpelaar and surveyor David Squance are full of praise for their new working environment.

The longer boom and stick are not the only strange features of this machine because it is also fitted with a specially-made cab with two seats – one for the operator and one for the surveyor.

The question is why go to so much trouble and expense to modify the excavator? The reason is simple, says Priscilla van der Haar, who heads up the

PUMA communications department. “It surveys the work carried out by the Blockbuster and other long-reach excavators from the safety of the shore,” she says. “It is ideal for surveying in water that is too shallow for survey vessels and too dangerous on foot.”

The Condor, like the Blockbuster, is the answer to a challenge. Every time the project is presented with a new one then PUMA designs new techniques to solve them. Initially, the engineering team puzzled over a tracked crane with the survey kit mounted on the lift hook.

They even considered a telescopic boom arrangement. However, the big drawback to both was on-site manoeuvrability. They preferred the flexibility and mobility of a standard hydraulic excavator, but a major obstacle here was the need for such a long reach – unheard of in the excavator world.

Eventually, early in 2010, they approached Snijder with the challenge to bring their plans to fruition and design a machine that was capable of wielding the superlong boom and stick. Six months of designing, building and testing culminated in a machine that extends the limits of the Cat 385 to the maximum. When fully stretched, the high tensile-made boom and stick has a lift capacity of a tonne, plenty enough for the 750kg weight of the ultra-sonic (multi-beam) surveying kit.

Surveyor David Squance confirms the real advantage is working in shallow waters, often of less than a metre. “It would be impossible to get this close with a boat,” he says.

All survey and GPS information is relayed via a cable along the boom and stick to a powerful in-cab computer. As a rule, David spends most of his time on the water behind computers on a survey vessel. He admits he has never ever sat on a machine like the Condor before.

“Being on an excavator is totally different,” he says, “and takes some getting used to.”

Fortunately, the surveying kit is the same. The only difference is that they also use laser scanners.

“This is great because as well as the underwater work we can also measure the volume of a help of stone on land” 2

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Main Picture and Right: Working alongside the Blockbuster and a fleet of conventional large excavators, the Condor plays a vital role in ensuring the different layers of blocks are accurately placed.

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The base Cat 385 excavator was modified by Snijder, including extensive work to the undercarriage, which now has an outer track width of 6.5 metres.

Top Left and Above: The ultra long-reach front-end equipment is counter-balanced by 7.6 tonnes of extra ballast at the rear and a significantly heavier undercarriage.

Below: The hydraulic cylinders fitted to the Condor’s boom and stick are much larger than those normally fitted to the Cat 385 and were specially made by Snijder.

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“This is great because as well as underwater work we can also measure the volume of a heap of stone on land,” he said.

While the Condor is well suited to dry surveying work, its main task is to monitor the water works. During my visit it was checking to ensure the profiling laid by one of the project’s Hitachi EX1200s was at the right height ready for the Blockbuster to start laying blocks.

“We also survey every stage of block laying to ensure they are all at the correct position and depth,” adds David.

Condor operator John Simpelaar has plenty of excavator experience, but he admits that when he first took to the seat it was really special. “Even though I soon got used to the size and controls, it is still a great machine to work with,” he says.

The Condor is different to anything he has ever done before. “If you enjoy production digging then this is not the job for you,” he adds. “This excavator is not needed for its speed of digging but its ability to gracefully and accurately position the surveying equipment.”

John admits it is not the most difficult job he has done, but stresses that care is needed and it requires a great deal of concentration.

“Swinging at the end of the stick is surveying kit that would cost several hundred thousand euros to replace,” he says. “I have to be careful not to hit a rock. One wrong move could cause thousands of euros of damage.”

That said, the machine is slow to move around, so there is always the chance to relax and have a chat when they shift to a new position. Both operator and surveyor clearly enjoy their roles, and with the generally wet and windy Dutch winter already upon them, the comfort of the heated cab is a real bonus.

Finally, another question is what will happen to the Condor when its role at MV2 is finished? Owner Snijder says there is a possibility that it could be transferred to another similar project, and is keen to talk to potential rental customers. However, should the work dry up then they say it is no problem to pull the machine apart and convert it back to its standard format. It is just possible that this excavator could at some point resume what it is really designed to do – dig.