The pulling tractor is the Ex Army Unipower tank transporter prototype. (Oshkosh got the contract) and Alstom bought the vehicle and modified it into a HH tractor. The pusher is the first (I think) Faun Koloss that ALE got in the 80’s.
12 Months ago, ALE bought the Transport division of Alstom and got the Unipower, three 8x4 Faun Goliaths (That ALE used to crew and maintain in the GEC days before it became ‘Alstom’) plus 4 or so girder sets.
I think both tractors weigh in at about 45-50T due to the ballast that is added so that the vehicles can gain traction.
The army still use a version of the Unipower for the BR90 bridging system used by the Royal Engineers. Don’t know why they chose the Oshkosh over the Unipower, no one seems to like it (apart from the accountants, I guess).
I thought the pusher was a Scammell Contractor at first. Glad jazzdrummer posted the right answer before I gobbed off!
jj72:
ok cheers tim, maybe they were airforce motors then - that’d explain why they got a VR.1 or a waiver from having one!
What’s a VR.1? I assume it’s the document you need to move an abnormal load, but why did you think it was strange that this load got one or a waiver? Was it because there was an alternative sea route?
What would be the type of planning needed to move loads like these and how long is it likely to take from the customer contacting you saying they have a 100tonne widget that’s 20ft wide by 80ft long to moving the load.
muckles, the VR.1 is an authorisation to move loads between 5.00 and 6.10m in width (special order covers over 6.10m wide / 30m long / 150te gross) which used to be issued by the DoT, but now comes under the highways agency in birmingham
the HA are under strict instruction to apply the deputy PM’s “water preferred” policy, but instead of concentrating on taking large flows of traffic off the roads like say 50 loads per day of paper from scotland to london, it singles out abnormal loads as they are an “easy” target
although i have great sympathy with the HA staff, in the past 18 months i have had some almost pythonesque conversations and letters from/to them due to this policy which I won’t go into, but one example was an authority we held from a regular customer’s factory which we’d used 7 or 8 times but was suddenly no longer allowable - so we ended up travelling by road to a nearer port, 18 hour ferry crossing to BELGIUM, 200yards across the docks, 12 hour ferry crossing to UK and 2 miles across those docks to get back on the ferry we wanted in the first place… and we wonder why british industry is knackered?
if we’re talking just width: a load of 4.99m wide takes 2 days to notify, 5.00-6.10m takes 2 weeks minimum and over 6.10m is 8 weeks minimum (presuming no great weight involved, meaning possible road/bridge surveys)
sorry to rant on rather a lot - more bureacracy gone mad though i.m.h.o
