By Ashley Karen
Liebherr has made a huge, near 8m-diameter main bearing for one of the world’s greatest TBMs due to bore in the city of Foshan, China.
The huge component is the mega tunnel boring machine main bearing made by Liebherr till now. It weighs over 47 small city cars. The 44t roller bearing has been manufactured for Shanghai Tunnel Engineering – a Chinese supplier of tunnel boring machine systems.
The bearing planned to be fitted behind the cutterhead, is going to be an integral component to assist the TBM to excavate a tunnel with the height of a five-story building. A Liebherr report represents that this was possible because of ‘double rollers in the bearing track, an extremely precise internal gearing, as well as due to 20 pinions that drive the bearing on the inner ring’.
Moreover, for the same machine, the firm is manufacturing the 7.3m-diameter erector bearing as well. Weighing 5.7t, it is going to take an essential role during the segment positioning process.
The gigantic TBM which is going to work in Fushan City in southern China, will excavate an 8km-long, 15.5m-high twin-deck road tunnel that is going to have three lanes of traffic on each level.
