road plate hire

There’s no doubt that for some sites, particularly where space to work telehandlers (or similar) is short, the ‘European’ concept of a tow-able or self-propelled tower crane for placing construction materials can be a real boon.

Of course some careful thought has to be given to the logistics of getting approximately 30 tonnes in one lump, in and out of a site.

In this case, Quantum Homes of Surrey and developers of note, highlighted a concern with the extraction process. It transpired that the next door property had a sizeable basement, which extended within a metre or 2 of the exit path for the Liebherr tower crane belonging to Sparrow Cranes.

So before the process of removing it could be considered, engineers were tasked with mitigating the axle loads as it was to pass along the 3.0m wide driveway between the buildings.

They in turn contacted the technical team here at ‘roadplatehire’ and a proposal for a combination of a crushed aggregate bed, levelled and compacted, was to be overlain with a carpet of our GPRM’s – and to give this a rock solid runway, it was in turn was topped with a combination of some of our larger range of 25mm plates at 4 metres x 2 metres, and 3 m x 1.5m. This ensured that any point loading, and the resultant localised underground thrust, was kept to an absolute minimum.

All this was planned just before the Covid-19 lockdown measures, meaning the whole scheme was put ‘on ice’ until it was safe to resume work.

On WC 19th May 2020 our team and equipment arrived on site for the 3 day install period. Supetrucks and SALLY’s proved invaluable as always, for safely placing units with pinpoint accuracy in confined spaces. The crane came out without a hitch and we removed the plates the following week.

Pictures courtesy of Simon Laughton