international
construction
november 2013
ROAD BUILDING
30
Technological advantages
mobilised for the actual project, everyone knew their job and we
could hit the ground running.”
On the job itself, the GHP-2800 paved 25 feet (7.6 m) wide
and 9" (229 mm) thick. Every 15 feet (4.6 m) the IDBI placed 25
dowel bars for transverse joints.
“We had 1000 joints on the project and we did not find one
bar that was out of place,” Mr Surianello said. “The GOMACO
service representative did a great job setting up the paver and my
guys really got tuned into it.”
Real-time pavement smoothness behind the GHP-2800 was
monitored by two paver-mounted GOMACO Smoothness
Indicator (GSI) units.
“We really found some interesting things using the GSI
and getting real-time smoothness numbers and what affects
the smoothness coming out the back of that paver. It was just
incredible,” said Mr Surianello
Paving production averaged around 2,600 feet (792 m) per
day, and the GSI showed the company it was reaching maximum
smoothness results at that speed.
>
“I’ve had some industry feedback stating straight out that this
is the smoothest concrete pavement that anybody has ever ridden
on in New York,” Mr Surianello proudly said. “And these are
blacktop guys saying it!”
Machine control advantage
In a different application of similar technology, TACC
Construction prepared an 800-acre (324 Ha) site in Oakville,
near Toronto, Canada ahead of a development by house builder
Mattamy Homes. The work involved laying out the final road
network, for which TACC used a GPS machine control system
on a curb & gutter slipform paver.
“We’re comfortable running our Topcon 3D-MC2 on our Cat
dozers that were used on the site,” said Frank Saracino, road
superintendent for TACC. “What was new for us was using
Topcon Millimetre GPS machine control on our Power Curber
5700-C. We like the Power Curber because it’s compact and
designed for tight radius jobs, which made it appropriate for the
subdivision with its meandering roads and cul-de-sacs. It was
pretty amazing to see how efficient the Millimetre GPS Topcon
system made the curber. We eliminated stringlines which saved
us time, labour, concrete waste, and it’s much more precise. The
technology made the Power Curber at least one and a half to two
times quicker than using traditional methods.”
There was 11 km of curbs laid throughout the development.
Mattamy Homes hired its own engineering firm to create
Harsh conditions
Volvo equipment performs in Canadian winter
Q
uebec-based equipment and civil engineering contractor, R&G St Laurent is working
on the Hydro-Quebec hydroelectric power project in Canada’s Côte-Nord region. Its
package of civil engineering work includes the construction of 4 km of access roads
as well as several structures on the scheme.
The work will result in moving over 500,000 tonnes of granite and 600,000 m
3
of soil.
The contract will require R&G to use its entire fleet of 26 Volvo machines – four A40F and
eight A35F articulated dump trucks (ADTs), one EC700C, two EC460C and two EC330C
excavators, three L120C, L120F and L220E wheel loaders, four compactors and two
SD105DX soil compactors.
The winter weather is borderline subarctic – the average temperature in December and
January slips below -17°C and an average 3.6 m of snow falls every year. With this in mind
the work is scheduled to be complete before December this year.
“Thanks to our team, favourable weather conditions and the excellent performance of our
Volvo equipment, we are almost a month ahead of schedule,” said co-owner Patrick St-
Laurent. “We found that the machines made it much quicker than we expected. We were
loading up 4,000 m
3
every day.”
Peab Asfalt used a Dynapac CC334HF split drum roller to
lay asphalt at a shipyard project in Sweden. The Dynapac
Compaction Analyzer Asphalt (DCA- A) logged asphalt
temperatures and which areas had been compacted.
TACC Construction used a Power Curbers 5700-C fitted with
Topcon 3D-MC2 machine control to lay 11 km of curbs
ahead of a housing development near Toronto, Canada. The
company said using this technology made the work one-
and-a-half to two times quicker.
