Author Topic: London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity  (Read 9573 times)

Offline Alan Green

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London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity
« on: January 24, 2014, 09:52:15 AM »
London Gateway have installed spreaders which allow double lifting capacity.

Article courtesy of Logistics Manager magazine:

DP World London Gateway has doubled the number of containers it can lift in one go, after introducing a spreader that can handle four 20 ft containers or two 40 ft containers at a time.

"We

Offline Alan Green

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Re: London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity
« Reply #1 on: January 24, 2014, 01:15:02 PM »
I seem to recall from an earlier post that the hourly lift rates at London Gateway were being criticised as too low = This is one way of doubling the lift rates.......

As the capacity of vessels continues to increase are we going to see corresponding increases in the size of spreaders (technology permitting) in order to minimise turnaround times.

Once again, as highlighted by Contributor Michael, I would have thought that the terminal operator needs to have a fairly accurate idea of the gross container weights.

Offline Alan Green

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Re: London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity
« Reply #2 on: January 24, 2014, 01:56:25 PM »
By coincidence, an interesting article appears in the February 2014 edition of Shipping Today & Yesterday (Page 26. Cargo Security & Transparency)in which reference is made to the Marine Accident Investigation Branch report into the MSC Napoli incident.

Of the containers removed from the MSC Napoli, 600 were weighed and 137 (23%) were found to have weight discrepancies of 3 tonnes or more. It was also found that 7% of deck loaded containers had not been stowed in the position shown on the cargo plan.

A copy of the report appears here:

 http://www.maib.gov.uk/cms_resources.cfm?file=/MSC%20Napoli.pdf

Offline adams

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Re: London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity
« Reply #3 on: January 24, 2014, 05:02:21 PM »
Just to clarify, maximum weight LG cranes will lift with 4x20' containers will be limited to 80 tons.

Offline Allan RO

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Re: London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity
« Reply #4 on: January 24, 2014, 05:18:02 PM »
I wonder how long it will be before a couple of overweight boxes are lifted and the crane collapses ?  This is almost certainly an accident waiting to happen unless all boxes are pre-weighed.

Allan

Offline adams

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Re: London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity
« Reply #5 on: January 24, 2014, 09:16:01 PM »
For export containers it is almost impossible to exceed QC SWL as boxes are weighted in ASC (automatic stacking cranes), SC (shuttle carrier) and on QC itself. Majority of 20' exports will be empties anyway.
For imports port have to be more careful. Apart from own weight control system, planners will have to give extra % of safety limits, so I guess we will not see quad lifts close to SWL limits.

Offline DAVE NINNIM

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Re: London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity
« Reply #6 on: January 24, 2014, 11:23:56 PM »
When I used to operate a 40 ton boat hoist the wires and strops had a load rating of 80 ton, the hoist had pressure relief valves making it impossible to lift anything over the declared operating weight of 40 tons. That was 13 years ago so I'm pretty sure with today's technology we wont be seeing any cranes collapsing.

Offline Michael

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Re: London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity
« Reply #7 on: January 25, 2014, 05:45:50 PM »
Interesting, I'll try and cover some of the above from what I know.

Quad lift isn't new technology, it's in use in the far east in a few ports already, however they all differ from LGW in that they use a trailer to park system, LGW doesn't, it uses straddles, unless I'm mistaken these are only one box wide? They have obviously thought about the system but as yet I cannot see how they can land to quay or load from quay with a land side system designed around one box width, in the far east they use tandem width trailers to accommodate quad lifts. Typically quad lift frames have an interconnecting system that can move the boxes apart, usually only just enough to match cell guides or peg positions on lids, it'd be some frame that can spread far enough to allow a straddles wheels to pass between the boxes.

Regarding weights and safety systems, it is unlikely there will be any crane failures due to quad lifts and if used for loaded containers then special efforts will need to be made to ensure a balanced load. The problem with quad or twin lift is load balance, it is critical tat you do not load one wire more than the others (cranes typically use a four wire system), on current systems there is a percentage difference allowed between left and right wires and fore and aft or any single wire over the other three, typically 25%. If you try and twin lift two 20' and the difference between boxes exceeds 25% left and right then the crane will stop, by the same virtue if you have a load that has shifted in a 40' and is corner heavy then it will also stop.

Now if you quad lift then you will have an expanded footprint, whilst your left and right extremities remain the same your fore and aft are increased, leading to greater risk of a load differential fore and aft.

One other factor with quad lifts are box heights, the system will cope with height differences of 6" easily and some with great care will cope with 12", above that then it will not work. Imagine loading two 40', one at 8'6" the other at 9'6", the higher to seaside, that's fine but the next layer either has to be two identical boxes or a reverse of the above heights or else the frame will not cope.

Whilst your loading it's simple to make sure all your boxes arriving at the quay face are height and weight matched, but for discharge your relying on other ports to make sure box heights ans weights fall into your criteria....good luck on that one.

One other aspect, what happens to a crane when a vessel does arrive with boxes of varying height to discharge and load where quad picking is not an option, looking at the LGW press it shows a massive head block that is more than one frame wide, thus they cannot change the crane to a simple single frame option, that crane looks dedicated to quad lifts so will be parked up for the duration of the vessel.

It will be interesting to see how they get on, but I don't think it'll be a technology that many other European ports will rush to emulate, automated stacks, yes, but quad lift is a brave operation to run.

Regarding LGW recent poor box rate, it's they automated stackers they are having issues with, they can get the boxes off and on the vessel quick enough but are swamping the yard, the yard cranes are so busy trying to keep up with the quay that they then cannot cope with hauliers. All the recent three vessels they picked up from Felixstowe were poorly turned around, so much so that one left early after only discharging 800 of the projected 2000 boxes. Indeed Maersk then canceled the Maersk Kiel call, re planned the European calls so that it could call at Felixstowe instead.

Rumor on the quay is that Maersk only sent the Gudrun Maersk down there to see if such a large ship could transit in and out of there, which it could. It'd be wise not to discount LGW, they will get there once they have got over these initial teething problems and a recent shipping report shows that UK box growth has outstripped Europe and by end of 2015 we will be short of deep water berths in the UK, and that report already takes into account a finished LGW and berths 10/11 at FSR. If Ports can weather out the next 24 months then the indications are that there will be enough big boats for everyone.

Sorry for the extended dialogue.
« Last Edit: January 26, 2014, 01:28:49 AM by Michael »

Offline Alan Green

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Re: London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity
« Reply #8 on: January 25, 2014, 08:56:22 PM »
A very, very interesting post.

I would agree with your last paragraph in that London Gateway only have to wait for the number of 18000 teu + vessels to increase in order to obtain calls due to the shortage of berths in the UK able to handle such vessels.

Offline Neil D

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Re: London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity
« Reply #9 on: January 26, 2014, 04:48:10 PM »
The overall UK deep sea container market isn't growing that much, partly because the UK economy is still quite flat, but also because its a mature economy and so its a mature container market. You get growth of a few per cent p.a. and not double digits.

The big thing though is that whilst the overall volumes aren't growing much, they are coming in much bigger ships - and yes, there aren't that many berths in the UK able to take the 13,000 teu+ sized vessels. This will be a big factor in pushing customers with Far East services to London Gateway. But don't forget that Southampton will be adding another deep berth next year and at Felixstowe they are extending Berths 8/9 to be able to take two ULCVs at once.

So there won't be a shortage of the very deep berths in the UK, but at the same time there won't be way too many. The tricky thing though is that the berths that were in the past used for Far East services (and which are now not deep enough/don't have big enough cranes) will be under-utilised.

Offline Neil D

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Re: London Gateway Doubles Container Lift Capacity
« Reply #10 on: January 27, 2014, 10:05:53 AM »
Sorry, yes, you are right. I had 2014 in my head but thought of it as "next year" !!

 

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