Liebherr's crawler cranes contribute to the construction of Switzerland's second-largest wind farm

Over the course of eight weeks, two Liebherr crawler cranes provided by Emil Egger AG, situated in St. Gallen, Switzerland, successfully assembled Switzerland's second-largest wind farm. The six turbines, produced by Enercon is projected to generate 22 million kilowatt hours of electricity each year. The installation of these nearly 140-meter-tall wind turbines was carried out using an LR 11000 and an LR 1700-1.0 crane.

          The most demanding scenarios at this construction site involve the lifting of the generators. According to Peter Stricker, who operates the LR 11000 crawler crane, the combined weight of the hook block, slings, and the load itself reaches a total of 71 tonnes. To accommodate the tallest assembly heights of approximately 100 meters, Stricker equipped his crane with a 114-meter-long main boom. While slightly lighter at 65 tonnes, the rotors were visually more striking than the generators or nacelle. The 40-meter-long rotor blades were first assembled on the ground to create complete blade sets, which were then lifted and installed. A specialized apparatus allowed these massive components to be pivoted into a vertical position during the lifting process.