FlYIng Figures
Here’s a high level look at what we were able to achieve on this project:
GE Wind Turbines
Transport Duration (Wks)
KM’s to Site
Total Deliveries
The Flyers Creek Wind Farm consisted of 38 GE 3.8-137 wind turbine generators, situated in central New South Wales. ARES transported all wind turbine components from Port Kembla to site, a distance of 420km one way.
Tetris for Grown Ups.
With almost 400 turbine components arriving into Port Kembla over five shipments, Flyers Creek would have been challenging to offload into any port. Add in the complication of Port Kembla being the main car import hub into Sydney and having an unprecedented backlog of vehicle shipments and the storage situation becomes a real oversized game of Tetris.
By working closely with the terminal operator AAT and utilising overflow storage areas where possible, the cargo was able to fit… just.
Lachlan Valley Loads
The wind cargo had to be transported up Lachlan Valley Way, through the townships of Boorowa and Cowra. With no bypasses available, loads had to carefully make their way through the towns, with blades in the early hours of the morning and towers during the day. Drivers, pilots, spotters and police escorts alike had to stay vigilant to ensure local traffic kept clear and the cargo was steered away from any obstacles such as light poles, trees and buildings.
The Long Way Around
The transport route from Port Kembla (Wollongong) to site was circuitous to get around the Blue Mountains. The loads ducked under the low bridges heading out of Wollongong, took the Hume Hwy to Yass, then Lachlan Valley Way up to Cowra before finally arriving at the wind farm – a journey of more than 400km.
Transformer Transporter.
Wind turbines weren’t the only cargo that we transported for this project. The 120-ton main transformer arrived into Port Kembla in January and took the same route into site using an 8-axle platform trailer. It was delivered to the wind farm substation, where it will boost the voltage of electricity generated from the wind turbines up to 132kV.
ARES were asked at very short notice to arrange the transport of this item. We had transport permits turned around within a week and the “trafo” was on site shortly after!
Oversized Offloads.
As part of our scope of work for this project, ARES were required to offload our own trucks and set the massive turbine components down next to the turbine foundations, ready for the installation cranes to lift them into place at a later date. Each component had a carefully selected spot on the turbine pad to be offloaded onto.
The ARES 200T crane was the perfect sized assist crane for this task, compact enough to fit and manoeuvre around the hardstand area yet strong enough to help lift 100-ton nacelles off the trucks.