Project Overview
Client
- A leading steel smelting and recycling group in the Middle East
Location
- Electric arc furnace melting shop, Ad Diriyah Industrial Area, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Crane Type
- QDY Type Metallurgy Double Girder Overhead Ladle Crane (for molten metal handling)
Quantity
Key Specifications
Capacity
- 32T (Main Hook) / 5T (Auxiliary Hook for tilting the ladle)
Span
Lifting Height
Duty Class
- ISO A7 (Heavy-Duty Metallurgy)
Ambient Working Temperature
- Designed for -10°C to +70°C (withstanding temporary infrared radiant heat up to +120°C)
Customer Challenges & Environmental Demands
Extreme Ambient & Radiant Heat
- Located in the desert region of Riyadh, summer temperatures can reach 50°C. Directly beneath the crane, heat radiating from the 1600°C molten steel ladle brings local temperatures up to 80°C. Standard steel structures easily suffer thermal fatigue under these conditions, risking dangerous girder sagging.
Zero-Failure Safety Requirement
- The crane transports 28 tons of liquid steel to the continuous casting machine. Any failure, such as brake slippage or gearbox shaft breakage, would lead to catastrophic liquid metal spills, destroying the workshop and threatening lives.
Conductive Dust Hazards
- The furnace area is saturated with highly conductive graphite and coke dust, which easily penetrates motor housings and electrical enclosures, causing short circuits.
Customized Solutions by Yixing Crane
Advanced Thermal Protection
- We lined the underside of the main girders with a
25mm thick aluminum-silicate ceramic fiber insulation blanket
, covered by a 3.5mm mirror-finish stainless steel heat shield. This reflects 85% of radiant heat, keeping the main steel plates safely below 45°C. Girders are made of specialty high-temper steel plates to maintain structural integrity.
Triple-Redundant Emergency Braking
Dual Service Brakes
1. The main hoisting gearbox features two independent hydraulic thruster brakes, each capable of safely holding 1.25x the rated load.
Emergency Drum Brake
2. We integrated a heavy-duty hydraulic caliper safety brake directly onto the wire rope drum. A safety PLC monitors the rotation ratio; if a drivetrain breakage occurs, the drum brake automatically locks the drum within 0.15 seconds, preventing load drops.
Metallurgical-Duty Protection
- All motors are upgraded to metallurgical-grade with Class H insulation and IP66 dust-proof ratings. The electrical controls are housed in an insulated, pressurized electrical room. Operators control the crane from a fully enclosed cab with double-pane heat-insulating glass and redundant heavy-duty air conditioners.
Results & Long-Term Value
Robust Middle East Performance
- The crane successfully passed all TUV-authorized third-party metallurgical safety inspections on-site, receiving a perfect A+ rating.
Proven Reliability
- Over the past 30 months, the crane has completed over 25,000 molten metal transfers. It has operated continuously through extreme sandstorms and summer heatwaves without a single unscheduled shutdown. The client's CEO stated in a letter of appreciation: "We compared very expensive European brands, but Yixing’s technical redundancy and exceptional high-temperature performance proved that Yixing is the premier choice for heavy-duty cranes."
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