Massive Machinery: Part 2

Here at Kompakt we sell small, medium and large bits of recycling machinery, but what we call large machinery, others might disagree. Those others are likely to be aware of some of the massive bits of machinery that are dotted around the world. In this series, we will take a look at such machines and tell you a little bit more about them.

Continuing with…

The Antonov An-225 Mriya

The Antonov An-225 Mriya, which means dream, or inspiration in Ukrainian, is the largest transport aircraft in the world. It is one of a kind. NATO refer to it as the ‘Cossack’, due to the region of South Russia and Ukraine that the machine hails from.

Despite being the only aircraft of its kind, it can be commercially rented for the flying oversized payloads because of how much cargo it can hold. What is most stunning about this piece of machinery is that it can be used to carry other aircraft. The pictures looks almost unreal (see above). It also has six turbine engines; if you’ve ever been on a plane, it can be almost guaranteed that it has just 2 engines.

The Mriya holds the world records for largest aircraft, largest airlifted payload, largest airlifted single item and largest wingspan of a commercial aircraft. These are just four records, which are a tiny fraction of the 240 records it holds. It truly is an outstanding piece of machinery, especially when you consider some of its main uses is providing mass amounts of food for disaster relief.

The Liebherr T 282B

The Liebherr T 282B is the world’s second biggest biggest truck. It was made back in 2004 by German construction machine manufacturers Liebherr Mining Equipment Co.

The beast can carry 400 tonnes (usually of earth, rock or other detritus) and still drive at an impressive 40mph. The designer, Francis Bartley, says that less than 75 of the machines are sold each year, which is still quite an impressive amount. It’s even more impressive when you consider that they cost minimum £2m each!

Up until 2013, the Liebherr T 282B was the largest dump truck in the world, but now it is second place to the BelAZ 75710 which we will feature later on in the series. We still felt it was important to include this machine, because, well look at it, it’s enormous! It’s also remarkable because two huge diesel engines (both with over 3,500hp) power an electric drive system. So in a way, it’s like a giant toy. In a way…

Despite being able to reach a top speed of 40mph, it’s too large and too heavy for public roads, so much be dismantled before it can go to another site. This dump truck earns its place in our list of massive machinery. Kudos.

And finally

The Prelude

Said nobody ever. In hindsight, we probably should have put The Prelude at the beginning (where preludes usually go), but we at Kompakt like to do things our own way…

So, let us tell you a bit about the Prelude. It appears to be a shit, but in fact, it is a floating natural gas facility with the ability to capture, process and store liquid gas from the Earth. If it was tipped vertically, it would be taller than the Empire State Building by around 45m feet. That means that the vessel is an astonishing 500m long (almost). The Prelude is 90m longer than the previous record holder, the Emma Maersk.

Imagine an olympic swimming pool. Now imagine ten, then 100, and then 175. Think of all that water. Now convert it into natural gas. That’s the capacity for the petrol tanks aboard the Prelude. The ‘ship’ drags and anchor along the floor for stability and pivots with the direction of the wind. This bit of machinery is too big for the Panama Canal, but it is resistant of category 5 hurricanes.

It was built by Samsung and Technip in South Korea and was launched in December 2013. The total cost of production is estimately to be between £6-8bn. The vessel is built to accommodate 340 crew members. All these numbers are a bit mind-blowing, so we will leave part two here, and invite you to come back and read part three soon…

Go back and read part one.