Returning to Montreal for a special project
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In the Groove The bulletin of Lebus International Engineers GmbH Issue 10: 2014 Returning to Montreal for a special project In the summer of 1976 the Canadian city of Montreal played host to the Olympic Games. An engineering feature of these games was the iconic leaning tower that inclines at 45o above the stadium. At 165 metres high, the Montreal Tower is said to be the world’s tallest inclined structure. A cable car carries sightseers to a viewing platform at the top of the tower, taking just two minutes. In 1986 Lebus Germany supplied equipment for the huge winch that moves the cable car up and down. And 27 years later, in 2013, Lebus returned to this famous landmark to renew the spooling equipment. The hoisting system is supplied by Swiss specialist Garaventa, which was Lebus’ customer on both occasions. Lebus supplied grooved split sleeves for bolting onto the drum, as is usual, but in this case there were some unusual features. As the rope spools onto the drum in a single layer, it was not necessary to use the special Lebus parallel grooving geometry for guiding the rope. Simple helical grooving is just as perfect in such applications. More unusual was the material of which the sleeves have been made: a synthetic Becorit composite material that is designed to create less wear on the wire rope than regular steel drum sleeves. However, after 27 years of continuous daily commuting up and down the tower, the cable system had started showing its age. Even this special material is not totally immune. The original sleeves were supplied by Lebus in 110 different segments. Advances in production technology meant that for the renewal it was possible to make the outer casing from just nine segments, each running the full 1338mm length of the drum and covering 40° of the drum circumference. Lebus expects the new sleeves to be good for at least as long as the old ones. And when the time comes to replace them, it will be a simple job to lift off the old and bolt on the new – such is the benefit of the Lebus system. The old sleeves (above) have now been replaced with new ones (above right) The cable car (left and right) takes sightseers up to a viewing platform on top of the 165m-high tower

Customer focus Fratelli Righini F.lli Righini winches all have the Lebus spooling system Fratelli Righini is an engineering and manufacturing company based in Ravenna, Italy, that has been operating in the offshore market since 1985. It is a well-known brand in the offshore industry with a large portfolio of products and solutions, including rotary winches for riser pull-in operations and mooring of floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) units. With its in-house engineering, manufacturing and testing facilities, F.lli Righini’s is able to meet the most severe requirements of the...

Lebus celebrates 50 years in Germany Lebus has celebrated the 50th anniversary of its operations in Cris Seidenather Germany with the official inauguration of a third production hall welcomes the guests at its factory in Bavaria. Lebus International Engineers GmbH began life in 1963 as a subsidiary of the US spooling systems pioneer LeBus. It moved to its current premises in Finning, near Munich, in 2002 to facilitate expansion. A second production hall was added in 2009 and the third was built in 2012, taking the total production area to 2800m2. The half-centenary celebrations were...

Engineers’ Corner Lebus secrets that no one can copy We here at Lebus are often asked: “Why does my wire rope not spool properly?” There might be all kinds of good answers to that question. First we need to find out a little more. “Do you have a Lebus drum?” we ask. “Yes,” they will often reply. “Or so our equipment supplier told us when we first bought the machine.” Naturally we explore further, and more often than not we discover that actually it is not a genuine Lebus drum but rather it has been designed and made by some other company, copying the basic principles originally developed by...