Ainscough in plant for Ecotricity

UK-based Ainscough Crane Hire's Heavy Crane Division used a 500 tonne telescopic mobile crane to erect a turbine at the Ford car factory in Dagenham, south east England.

Ecotricity contracted Ainscough to erect two turbines, first of which was an Enercon E66 on a 85 m tower. After offloading the turbine sections from transport, a Liebherr LTM 1500 rigged with 135 tonnes of counterweight, 47.3 m main boom at 83 degrees, plus 42 m of luffing fly jib. Completing the set up was the Y-Guy system and spacer attachments bought especially for wind turbine erection. Ainscough also provided the 300 tonne capacity LTM 1300 for tailing.

The heaviest part of the lift was the nacelle, which came in at 51 tonnes, then the hub and blades, which weighed 38 tonnes.

Steve Wathen, technical sales manager at Ainscough's Heavy Crane Division, said, “This contract was unusual in the fact that we were erecting the turbine in the close vicinity of a working car plant, where we usually erect turbines on open land. This did not cause any problem and we were delighted with the smooth operation carried out by our employees and the Ecotricity team.”