Impact Handling sells two 60 tonne forklifts

The purpose-built heavy duty Konecranes trucks, capable of handling the largest and most demanding of loads, have helped enable ambitious projects across the construction and industrial sectors.

Impact worked closely with its customers and the Konecranes factory team to carefully design the customised machines to perfectly fit their intended applications. A comprehensive delivery and training support programme ensured the machines were efficiently integrated into their new environments, backed up by Impact's extensive UK parts supply.

Impact Handling MD Terry Kendrew says: “There hasn’t been a single 60 tonne machine sold in the UK for over 10 years – by any manufacturer – and we have just delivered our second in only a matter of months, with more on our order books and in production.”

“These 60 tonne machines allow project planners to think bigger and are capable of delivering increased efficiencies of scale. With the quality and reliability of the Konecranes product really coming into its own in these most extreme of applications.”

The first of the giant machines was commissioned for Harsco Metals at Liberty Steel’s Rotherham works site and fulfils a crucial role as part of the revitalised UK Steel industry.

The second 60 tonne machine entered service as part of the innovative Aberdeen Harbour Extension Project (AHEP). The AHEP, saw Spanish marine engineering specialist, Dragados, seek to scale its breakwater ‘Accropode’ technology to new heights. Konecranes heavy lift trucks, having proven their reliability across all of Dragados’s previous global Accropode projects, were the natural partner.

Not only did the massive 40 tonne Accropodes challenge Konecranes’s engineers with their long load centres, but the construction site required the lift trucks to travel a remarkable 800 metres fully laden, over a significant gradient. Impact’s official Konecranes dealer for Northern Scotland, Gray Forklift Services, worked closely with Dragados to overcome these logistical and site handling challenges to ultimately enable the AHEP to meet its operational objectives.

Keith Robertson, managing director at Gray Forklift Services explains: “Being so large, the Accropodes are manufactured in a specialist facility on site. With the demanding schedule of the project necessitating 12 hour shifts to achieve a remarkable output of one Accropode every twenty minutes. These then need to be moved for curing and finally carried all the way down to the harbour construction site to be craned into their final position within the breakwater.”

The project sees Grays supply all material handling equipment for the Aberdeen Harbour Extension site.