Street Crane has completed its second installation for JDR, supplying a high-specification 25-tonne double-girder ‘goliath’ crane for the company’s Hartlepool manufacturing facility (www.streetcrane.co.uk).

JDR, a leading supplier of sub-sea umbilical and power cables to the offshore energy industry, selected Street to manufacture and install the 15m-span crane to load 20-tonne cable bobbins into a new horizontal lay-up machine (HLM).

The HLM, which is the biggest in the UK and the second-largest in the world, gives JDR the ability to nearly double its output.

It comprises 16 bobbins, which store the steel tubes and cables that are woven together to make the sub-sea umbilicals and cables.

Chris Lindley-Smith, Street Crane sales director, said: “This was a bespoke crane designed with a range of additional features, including radio control and frequency inverter drives; these ensure that the crane operates extremely smoothly and the operator can position themselves in the optimum location for safe control of the crane at all times.

“Audible and visual alarms were specified, as was an interlock system with zone limits. This ensures that the crane is limited to a low speed when it enters a specified working zone and stops a safe distance away from the HLM.

“As this is a goliath crane, floor rails have been mounted on the working floor area to make the crane installation completely independent of the building’s structural steelwork, with electrical power to the crane supplied by a spring-operated cable-reeling drum mounted at the base of one of the goliath legs.”

The new crane complements an existing 72-tonne overhead crane which was manufactured and installed about five years ago by Street Crane, which is based in Chapel-en-le-Frith.

The 11m-span double-girder crane operates on a 30m-long free-standing gantry system and is used for reel loading and unloading.