29 mm

29 millimeters was the leeway we had to move a 22 ton plant to its intended site.

There was space enough in the 1,200-square-meter factory. But entry was difficult, unlike nearly 20 years ago. Back then, in 1996, the then new – and now old – bottle cleaning plant was moved in with a mobile crane on the north side of the building near the railroad tracks. In the meantime, a second set of tracks had been added. Taking that same approach would have meant night work and closing down tracks.

Together with the customer, Bauberger devised a new plan for moving the plant into the factory. RAMSEIER Suisse AG had built a new logistics platform, which meant the warehouse next door was empty. But the entrance for mobile cranes was too small. So, four column lifts with a total lifting capacity of 360 tons were used instead.

First, the plant was brought onto the ramp and into the factory by means of a 100 ton knuckle boom crane and the Montylift-36. Then it was hoisted onto the pallet by the Montylift-36, raised up by the column lifts and then pushed on rails to the entrance. Beforehand, a hole had been unceremoniously knocked out between two load-bearing elements – a solution as clever as it was inexpensive. The challenge at that point was to push the 3,791-mm-wide machine through the 3,820-mm-wide opening in the wall at a height of 8.5 meters. The task entailed moving a 22 ton plant with an accuracy to the nearest millimeter.

The old bottle cleaning machine was used for practice as it were. It was an imposing 12,500 mm by 4,300 mm by 3,750 mm in size and weighed 44 tons. It was first dismantled in the upper story and then transported by means of column lifts to the floor of the ground-level warehouse.