Pumping high

Sailaj Verma Senior,
Vice President Sales,
KYB-Conmat India.

V G Sakthikumar,
Managing Director,
Schwing Stetter Sales And Services Pvt Ltd.

There is growing demand for high rise buildings in India. However, reaching at sky touching height requires state-of-the-art equipment. Similarly, placing concrete at such height is tough tasks. On this note, the feature will describe on the offerings, innovations and challenges.

Risk factors and challenges to place concrete at heights
Skyscrapers or high-rise buildings in the city are characterised as a landmark. They add to render an experience to lay eyes on the entire city at a glance. Building one such involves inherent risk and expertise. For smooth construction, it is necessary to have experts who can manage technologies from material to maintenance, and apply them to the work. “The key element technologies of skyscrapers are construction of mega mat foundation, delivering architectural load into the ground, structural system optimisation, high-rise building measurement technology, and construction equipment technology. Concrete pumps technologies are essential for high- rise buildings. Today various range of concrete pumping machines are available that are economical and smart. It places the concrete at the desired height and place,” says Sailaj Verma Senior, Vice President Sales, KYB-Conmat India.
Explaining about the risk factors and challenges to place concrete at heights Sakthikumar says, “High compressive strength self-compacting concrete pumping-the pumping of high grade concrete mix is very tough than normal grade concrete mix.”

Schwing Stetter has high pressure concrete pumps for handle the vertical concrete back column pressure over 240 bar and these pumps are suitable to pump high grade concrete mix like M70 above 500 metre height also.
Schwing Stetter has high pressure concrete conveying pipeline and clamps in variable thicknesses and sizes for handling high concrete pressure.
He adds, “High rise rapid construction day-to-day the deshuttering time of formwork is getting reduced and upcoming new technologies in shuttering methods like Peri form work, so we have to place concrete in within time frame so Schwing Stetter has high rate concrete placing equipment like separate placing boom in the range of 25 metre boom length to 42 metre boom length, which give the optimum concrete placing output.”
Sailaj Verma Senior Vice President sales, KYB-Conmat India, “In the early day's wood scaffolding were used by labours as the way to bring the material at different elevations of the building. This was very unsafe for human life, labour oriented, time consuming and not accurate as well, which was thus delaying the project on site, this gave birth to the rope type elevator which got into further innovation to R&P Elevator which is used for man and material movement and is self-erecting.”
Safety during operation is the major concern of the industry. To tackle this challenge, KYB-Conmat elevator machines have been designed, keeping in mind, the human and the machine safety.
KYB-Conmat has 1, 1.5 and 2 tonne capacity R&P construction elevator, which is used for passenger movements and also to carry goods and materials that can use used for under construction buildings. The operation of elevator is completely automatic PLC based with HMI system.
Verma adds, “Construction elevator of KYB-Conmat has a number of safety features, one of which is the safety device that ensures that even in a complete failure of the drive the cage will not fall down. A mechanical, spring loaded safety brake is a standard feature in all KYB-Conmat elevator models. It improves the safety and reliability of the elevator in everyday use. The safety brake is well protected from dirt and dust, which is practically maintenance free.”

Latest offering
Informing about the latest offering in the concrete pumping segment for high-rise buildings V G Sakthikumar, Managing Director, Schwing Stetter Sales and Services Pvt Ltd says, “Our latest offering in the concrete pumping for high-rise is heavy duty stationary pump SP 4507. This new development is for the present trend of high rise pumping requirement especially in growing real estate markets like India and abroad. This caters to high rise segment where the present challenges of pumping the mix with stiff consistencies at a faster rate to around 300 metre vertical.”

Sakthikumar who is also Convenor for Membership committee, ICEMA, Chairman of Mechanisation committee, Builders Association of India shares other features;
• The pump develops 203 bar pressure on concrete and delivers an output of 54m3/hr in high pressure configuration.
• The pump kit and rock valve of the SP 4507 each have their own hydraulic circuit. It helps to handle high grade mix. The full power of the pump kit will be available-regardless of the switching movements of the rock. This ensures a quiet pump behaviour, high pumping capacity and protection of the components with less vibration.
• The new generation 'rock' comes with high efficient energy transfer on the concrete.
• New operator interface and emergency pressure release system will ensure safe operating environment.
Schwing Stetter is working on customised solutions for concrete conveying pipeline and clamping arrangement to improve pumping efficiency. Compact placing booms to make the system feasible and to improve output. Easy switchover of high and low pressure systems in concrete pump hydraulics to save time and convenience in operation. Concrete pressure measurement systems (sensors) are to be incorporated so that concrete consistency will be monitored.

Range of the pumps
Sailaj Verma Senior Vice President sales, KYB-Conmat India shares about the complete range of KYB-Conmat i-Pump technology machines. He says, “KYB-Conmat pursues a research and development (R&D) strategy that is closely linked to its client's expectations. This need alignment and the perpetual success of the stationary concrete pumps have given the industry, a whole range of i-Pump technology machines which includes the SCP 5000 and SCP 7500. The stationary concrete pump with intelligent controls have many features like S-Valve technology, robust electronic operation controls and management with manual overdrive, also its suitable for high pressure pumping in Indian ambient conditions and that's whys it's one of the most sought-after pump in its class.”
He adds, “The i-Pump technology concrete pump makes transfer and placement easier and faster for casting of civil structures. It also reduces manpower requirement at the site and also avoid human errors in the process that makes the i-Pump technology machines very economical to run and are environmentally friendly.”

KYB-Conmat has come out with an intelligent system that projects the critical parameters of functionality in machine. This allows the customer to not only identify the health of the machine but also informs him about the concrete which is desired by the client. The end goal is optimum utilisation of machine for the mutual benefit of its customers and clients.

The company has rapidly paved towards innovation for high rise buildings. KYB-Conmat's concrete pumps are being used in RMC sector extensively. “Here we have mixed type of concrete placement job. We have pumped rough concrete in different site at different heights. The intrinsic design of the machine is such that concrete flows under very less pressure and hence can reach greater heights without much of wearing to the parts. With onset of our production which is a decade old we incorporated close to 3,500 equipment in all ranges at KYB- Conmat,” says Verma.

Schwing Stetter's list of products:
• Flat gate valve: BP 350/ SP 1800/SP 2800
• Concrete pumps: SP2509/SP2800
• Heavy duty concrete pumps: SP 3000/SP 3500/SP 4507/SP 4800/SP 8800
• Truck mounted concrete pumps: S17/S20/S36X /S43 SX
• Separate placing Boom: SPB 25/32/35
• Mobile mixing plants: M 30Z/M21Z/M1/M1.25/M2.25/M2.5
• Concrete recycling plant RA12/RA20
• Sound proof canopies
• Water cleaning system
• XCMG piling rigs
• XCMG diaphragm grab
Highrise projects
Informing about the projects currently the company is working Sakthikumar says, “A 385 metre vertical height, mixed use development project in Mumbai is being constructed using Schwing Stetter India equipment as listed in the table.”

Material Model Quantity
Heavy duty concrete pump SP 8800 3
Separate placing boom SPB 35 2
Separate placing boom SPB 30 1
Batching plant M2.25 1

He adds, “A 340 metre vertical height, Omkar 1973 in Worli is being concreted using Schwing SP4800 concrete pump along with separate placing boom SPB35.
The vertical height is expected to reach the maximum height of 340 metre. The project also has Stetter M2.25 batching plants and has produced and pumped various grades of concrete like M80, M70, M60
and M50.

Hits: 297