Transporter simplifies shipping nacelles
May 11, 2010 by Paul Dvorak
Filed under Transportation of Wind Components, Wind Power News
A nacelle frame (the blue structure) mounts flush and without play into longitudinal beams of the trailer. For empty trips, the longitudinal beams fasten to the loading platform without lashing.
A German truck designer has collaborated with a hauling company and engineers from Vestas Wind Systems to devise a trailer just for transporting the latter company’s wind-turbine nacelles. Trailer manufacturer Goldhofer AG developed the equipment to handle the recent Vestas Mk6 and Mk7, 2-MW nacelle. The trailer is said to score well with crews in terms of how well it drives, levels of safety, and simplicity of operation.
Goldhofer says it also worked with Danish hauling specialists Torben Rafn & Co. A/S, which was first to order a trailer to transport wind-power plants and tower sections. “The nacelle transporter makes handling large sections less complex and less expensive,” says Goldhofer AG CEO Stefan Fuchs.
The design is said to accommodate a nacelle’s eccentric center of gravity by taking into consideration its longitudinal and lateral offsets. Design benefits include more even axle loading and no special driving skills even over rough terrain. The nacelle transporter was designed for tight turns often encountered with long trailers. Loading a nacelle is said to be straightforward thanks to a side-mounted attachment and a method that allows fastening longitudinal beams as needed. Other pluses: Set-up times drop and it is not necessary to use a crane to remove the nacelle from the trailer. It’s also no longer necessary to lash a nacelle to a trailer thanks to the flush fit of the Vestas transport frame (the blue ring and frame in the picture) and a play-free fastening mechanism with lock pins which also ensure safe shipping. What’s more, trailer sections can ride one upon the other to considerably shorten the equipment for empty trips.
The trailer can set up for a load as needed by adding more axels and wheels. In trucker’s terminology, the trailer can operate as 2+4, 3+5, 3+6, or 4+6, depending on loads and road regulations.
The trailer is also useful in other transport jobs. “The design works well in terms of flexibility and economical operation. For example, payloads up to 95 tons can be carried on a 10-axle heavy-duty module,” says Fuchs. WPE
Windpower Engineering Editor Paul Dvorak is an experienced mechanical engineer. Paul has seven years of hands on mechanical engineering experience and 23 years of technical writing. Paul is constantly in correspondence with wind turbine manufacturers and wind power researchers. Thanks to this correspondence, he is able to write about wind engineering topics before any other editor in the wind space.
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