Palfinger Marine has launched a new 3D-compensation module designed for mounting on the company’s knuckle boom, telescopic boom or stiff boom cranes to transfer goods between the service operation vessels (SOVs) and wind turbines or other fixed offshore installations. The 3D-compensation enables positioning of the cargo on the wind turbine or substation/installation despite movements of the vessel due to waves and currents, as the 3D-compensation steadies the load vertically and the boom tip horizontally, Palfinger Marine said.
The low weight being compensated for provides an advantage because it has less of an influence on the ship stabilising systems and also requires less power consumption when in 3D mode, according to the company.
The 3D-compensation module comes with a tailor-made MRU, and can be dismounted and parked in a separate cradle, allowing the crane to be used as a standard offshore crane when not in use.
“The conventional products on the market are huge, very expensive, require a lot of power and are not as flexible as our solution. To offer our customers a more satisfactory solution, we knew it was essential that the new unit was lightweight, could be applied modularly to any sort of crane and could easily be taken on and off,” says Jan Silgjerd Head of Sales, Palfinger Marine Offshore Cranes.
Palfinger has also recently launched a Palfinger Blade Access (PBA) system which will be used for the first time by Senvion at the Thornton Bank I, II and III offshore wind farms in Belgium.
The new system for blade inspection and repair combines the Palfinger Marine nacelle crane PK 40002 M with a workman basket specially developed in cooperation with PP Techniq.