48 hours re-opening

Using demolition tools from Atlas Copco helped to maximise productivity on a highly time-sensitive project in Germany. The A3 autobahn runs from the Dutch/German border through the western part of the Ruhr area, the Cologne area, the Rhine-Main area and Bavaria down to the Austrian border at Stuben. It is one of the most heavily used highways in Germany and because of increasing traffic volumes, widening the road to six lanes has become necessary.
July 6, 2012 Read time: 2 mins
Using Atlas Copco demolition attachments helped the fast removal of an old bridge over a busy German autobahn in a strict timeframe
Using demolition tools from 161 Atlas Copco helped to maximise productivity on a highly time-sensitive project in Germany. The A3 autobahn runs from the Dutch/German border through the western part of the Ruhr area, the Cologne area, the Rhine-Main area and Bavaria down to the Austrian border at Stuben. It is one of the most heavily used highways in Germany and because of increasing traffic volumes, widening the road to six lanes has become necessary.

Near Randersacker an old bridge crossing the river Main built in 1964 was demolished using explosives and a new wider one was erected just 3m away. This new bridge is already in use.

After the 540m long Main bridge was blown up, the B13 underneath the bridge was to be re-opened to traffic in just 48 hours. This required some 1,500m3 of reinforced concrete which collapsed on this particular section of the B13 to be crushed and another 800m3 of a layer provided to protect the top surface of the road to be removed. Across the entire length of the former pre-stressed steel bridge, a total of 25,000m3 of reinforced concrete had to be taken care of.

Eight Atlas Copco hydraulic breakers with service weights from 1.2-7tonnes were used for the job by the contractor Ruppert KG Erdbau + Abbruch while six hydraulic pulverisers were used to crush the bridge fragments on the spot. Part of the bridge could not be demolished using explosives and was instead cut down using Atlas Copco CC 2500 U and CC 3300 U CombiCutters mounted on 718 Liebherr R954 and R974 long reach excavators. The B13 was already cleared after just 36 hours, so that the Federal road could be opened to traffic much earlier than scheduled.
Maintenance

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Almost gone: Canada’s old Port Mann Bridge deconstructed
    August 14, 2015
    Three years ago a welder’s cut halved Canada’s old Port Mann Bridge. David Arminas reports from the banks of the Fraser River. By the time this issue of World Highways reaches you, one of Canada’s iconic steel arch bridges will be a shadow of its former self. It’s been a three-year demolition job since the first cut across the deck of the old Port Mann Bridge just outside the city of Vancouver on Canada’s Pacific coast. A new 10-lane 2.2km Port Mann Bridge opened in 2012 (see box). It runs parallel to the o
    Read More
  • Air helps build bridge
    February 13, 2012
    Chinese contractor Shanghai Sheng Xin Construction Co is using an Atlas Copco XAS 67 compressor on a new road bridge project in Shanghai. The new bridge is at Dan Ba Road, one of the main arteries in this older part of the city.
    Read More
  • Video captures nocturnal bridge demolition in Germany’s Ruhr area
    November 17, 2014
    It was a 24-hour job to demolish the bridge called On Leiterchen that crossed over the A43 in the industrial Ruhr area of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia.

    Traffic was stopped in both directions between junctions Recklinghausen-Hochlarmark and Recklinghause-Herten.

    Before the serious work of nibbling away at the concrete structure could start, a 50cm layer of sand was spread across the entire motorway to protect the pavement from excavator machine tracks and falling concrete. The bridge eventually jack-knifed in on itself.
    Read More
  • PPRS: the positive side of structural failures
    March 27, 2018
    You learn from your failures, not your successes. That was the overall message for delegates during the day-two morning session on the impact of engineering structural failures. These lessons are also too often “painful”, said Anne-Marie Leclerq, deputy minister for infrastructure within the ministry of transport for the Canadian province of Quebec. On September 30, 2006, a span of the six-lane Concorde Bridge in Laval, near Montreal, collapsed crushing to death five people and injuring six. Only recently
    Read More

Highlighted Content