October 20, 2005:
Lifting Concrete Girders
This is a continuation of the story of removing concrete girders. I
first watched this while the I-26 overpass was being removed.
Here is the setup - the Grace and Pearman overpasses (over Immigration
Drive) and a few guys starting to set up the crane. I stiched
together a video from a group of photos showing the
crane lowering a concrete
girder.(15 Mb mpeg).
And the crane in its sleeping configuration
A view of the Pearman and Grace passing over Immigration Drive looking south
The overpass looking south down Immigration Drive. Note Jackie in his Cat
above as the crane lowers a concrete girder
Another view of the Immigration Drive setup (Neil's night team)
The Pearman concrete girders and the crane in its erect position
Once the girder is positioned, the shear is used to break up the girder into
smaller segments.
Watching the shear at work at night is just plain fun
and more fun as it takes another bite from the girder
Now to lift the next girder, the hoisting cable is wrapped around the girder
Two teams attach the hoisting cables
and then the right guys cut through the girder attachment over the supporting
pier.
Then Jackie moves in above and hammers around the girder to break it loose
A closer view of hammering
Then Paul's team above cuts the attachments
like a July 4th celebration
Then Jackie picks up one end of the girder with his shear
and lifts and separates
then the crane takes up the slack and Jack lets go of the girder
The crane then picks up the girder and rotates it slightly to clear the
supporting structures
more lifting
then lowering the girder
down
down and down
and rotating it to place it in the graveyard - food for the shear