Rosneft PJSC

‘OKB “Spetstyazhproekt” LLC had offloaded 6 hydrocracking reactors weighing from 600 to 1300 tons from the vessel and transported them to the installation site for the refinery.

The use of cranes for unloading would have required concrete to be laid on the beach. The engineers developed the Ro-Ro unloading project. A special pier, which goes far into the sea, was built.

During the work on unloading one of the reactors from the barge, when the welders had already cut off the supports, an earthquake with a magnitude of up to 4 points occurred and seismic tremors caused sea turbulence. The head of the project, Sergei Tropin, faced a task that required an immediate decision: whether to stop unloading the barge and take to the sea, or to continue unloading. Tropin decided to unload the reactor.  Thanks to the exact calculation and coordinated work of the entire team of specialists, the unloading was a success.

On the construction site of ‘RN-Tuapse Refinery’ specialists of ‘OKB “Spetstyazhproekt” LLC carried out lifting and installing six hydrocracking reactors with a weight of 600 to 1300 tons to the design vertical position.

The peculiarity of this project was that the construction of a hydrocracking unit was carried out in the conditions of extraordinary space limitations of the construction site. Even theoretically, the use of traditional cranes of the necessary lifting capacity   was impossible in this area. The project task was complete only due to availability of the unique lifting and transport system B-SET – the only one in Russia.  Specialists of the company installed the equipment brilliantly, with a jeweler’s precision.

The route for the transportation of Italian equipment with a total weight of 2,500 tons for ‘Achinsk Refinery VNK’ JSC passed along the Northern Sea Route, along the Yenisei River, up to the village of Kubekovo, near Krasnoyarsk, and lastly 203 km on M53 highway to the destination.

The transportation by road (which was the most difficult part of the project) started on the night of August 28, 2013. The cargo consisted of 4 hydrocracking reactors, the largest of which weighed 1306 tons. The transportation of such cargo for a distance of more than 200 km by public roads was undertaken for the first time in the history of heavy transportation.

With the help of specially constructed bridge-crossings, the motorcade crossed 16 rivers, 168 transmission lines, 3 railway crossing, a pedestrian overpass and a few descents and climbs with a slope up to 12% on the way to the refinery. The cars were moving by day and by night, with an average speed of 1.5 km/h. The operation lasted more than 2 months.

In 2013, for the first time in Russia, four hydrocracking reactors with a weight of up to 1,306 tons were hoisted and installed in the design position at the Achinsk Refinery using the self-erecting lifting system “B-SET”.

In 2014, on September 16, the project of installing the reactor and the separator of the hydrotreating unit for diesel fuel in the working position on the foundation was successfully implemented at “Syzran Oil Refinery” JSC. Lifting of large-scale heavy equipment (weighing up to 750 tons) and installation in design position were carried out with the use of the lifting and transport system B-SET.