The 11-axle XCA4000 wheeled mobile crane, made by XCMG, has made its first lifts at a 200 MW wind farm in Jing County, Hengshui, China.
The XCA4000 crane has a rated lifting capacity of 4,000 tonnes and, according to the specification sheet, can hoist 230 tonnes to a height of 170 metres. This makes it the biggest wheeled mobile crane ever built.
Earlier this month it lifted a series of components at the Jing County wind farm for Hebei Rongcheng Technology. These included a 130-tonne wind turbine nacelle, a 40-tonne wheel hub, and three 95-metre-long blades weighing 28 tonnes each, to a height of 162 meters for assembly on the tower.
The XCA4000 has more than a dozen sensors distributed on the boom to detect and eliminate hazards in real-time, XCMG says.
It used to be the Germans that led the way on the biggest mobile cranes – Gottwald, Demag and latterly Liebherr. Now it is the Chinese, driven by demand for erecting ever bigger and higher wind turbines. XCMG has made more than 200 mobile cranes with capacities of 1,000 tonnes or above in recent years.
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