The heaviest monolith quarried and transported

We often are awed by the heavy lift marvel jobs which happen today. Not to mention, the heavy lift contractors themselves try to gain as much publicity when they do the "heaviest" or the "biggest" lifts or transports.

I used to think that todays equipment and engineering has made us far better in heavy lifts than what we were say 100 years back. I was wrong...point blank.

I recently came across an event in the history which happened in the year 1768. This was the shifting of a 1250T monolith for a distance of 6km. Wikipedia states that its still holds the record for the heaviest quarried and moved monolith.

I am talking about the Thunder Stone at St Petersberg.

The shifting equipment was designed and the project was ingeniously engineered and executed by Marinos Carburis, the first Greek to hold a diploma in Engineering.

Since, the stone had to be shifted from marshy terrain, they waited till winter so that the soil is frozen and hard. It was then transported from the quarry area to the ship and then to the city.

"He developed a metallic sledge that slid over bronze spheres about 13.5 cm (6 inches) in diameter, over a track. The process worked in a way similar to the later invention of ball bearings"- Info Source http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bronze_Horseman#Thunder_Stone

I was humbled. Designing and use of balls for sliding or skidding before even invention of ball bearings is out of the world. To surprise you more...this technique of shifting is used even today by heavy lift contractors!

Introduction to Alternate Lifting

This is my second blog inspired by the overwhelming response to my first blog heavytransportindia.blogspot.com 

I have been trying to get this through for the last 6 months.

While my first blog was related to the heavy transportation industry, it struck me that transportation is a part of heavy lift. So, i decided to create this blog which deals with heavy "Lifts" majorly aimed at alternate lifting and its relevance in India.

Generally heavy lifts are associated with cranes, which is understandable as today most of the heavylifts are done by extensive usage of heavy duty cranes and thats a huge subject in itself.

In this blog I will try to explore the very rarely explored world of Alternate Lifting, which we in the industry generally call it. That is an irony in itself...because this heavy lift technique has been practised way before cranes were invented.

Alternate lifting cannot be defined as a set of heavy lift techniques. Its a lifting technique which  may use multiple lifting of shifting techniques combined to resolve critical heavy lift challenges and get the desired result.

Arguably, the construction of the Egypt pyramid is THE major heavy lift project humans accomplished in the ancient world. There are different theories on these heavy lifts and shifts which even today are argued upon.

The world of Alternate lifting is only limited to ones imagination.