APE is Breaking the Mold on Traditional Drill Tools
APE has had a long lasting commitment to discovering new ways to benefit the foundation market and the needs of our customers. After extensive R&D we are excited to release the Polar Penetrator series of specialized drill bits. These bits are designed to be run with air that is fed through cutouts in the bits base, the air is ushered through these ports to the cutter face in order keep the cutting plain clear and working hard to reach your final depth. The Polar Penetrator bits can make quick work of frozen dense clays and tundra, as well as tightly consolidated silts and sands of drier climates. These bits will counteract the balling effect that plugs up other forms of drilling and will show less wear due to the quick evacuation of the cuttings away from the teeth. Not to cut short the advantages presented by the traditional CFA, Drag, Tri-cone and Pressure Digger bits, but this bit will add a formidable tool to your arsenal in the war against unforgiving soils. APE’s HD line of drills are a great option to run these bits coupled with our custom Quickloc Drill Stems.
Please take a moment CLICK HERE view the attached link to find out more about APE’s new addition to our foundation and drilling tools.
APE Helical Pile Program
APE has developed Helical Pile systems that will change the nature of helical pile as they are seen by the deep foundations industry. Helical piles have been for most of their history produced by manufacturers who have focused on small diameter screw anchors. These anchors began as tie downs for cables supporting power poles and evolved into small diameter screw anchors used on low capacity foundations. The bolt together sections, homemade driving equipment and the lack of main stream engineering made them suspect and generally unaccepted by the deep foundation industry.
As the industry evolved a core group of manufacturers began to generate larger anchors and more sophisticated drilling equipment. Unfortunately the bolt together sections and lack of involvement by the greater community of deep foundation contractors has left helical piers or anchors, filling an insignificant niche in the industry. Coupled with engineering that is unsupported by the most of the geophysical engineering community. A push for over ten years to correlate drive torque to load capacity of the anchors has been refuted by the general community of engineers and unsupported by many of the people involved in the larger diameter higher energy helical pile industry.
APE has embarked on a program that encompasses material manufacture and supply, equipment development and engineering that relies on the standard principles for deep foundations developed by engineers for over 900 years since the Romans were driving piles in Europe. Additionally APE has added patented drive and coupling technology developed by contractors in the Northwest. This technology has been proven over hundreds of thousands of feet of helical pile, that have been load tested, statically and dynamically hundreds of times. APE has purchased this technology and APE engineers added their years of experience to develop the first mainstream equipment to be specifically designed to install helical piles.
Socket Drive Technology
If you have ever used a socket to turn a bolt you can understand why the APE socket drive technology is simple, reliable and the best way to transmit torque into a pile to drive it. APE has patents on external Socket and internal Allen wrench type drives. Any drilling equipment can be easily modified to use the socket drive technology.
Threaded and Coupled Pile Sections
APE has developed material that uses high strength oil field casings that are threaded and coupled with an APE patented coupler. This connection continues the pile shaft sectional strength through the connection in tension, compression and bending. The connection can be made in less than a minute and makes low headroom work simple. This connection also allows for any depth of pile. Very deep drives are not a restriction for this system. Without the socket drive technology you cannot make up threaded connections, the other systems using large pins to drive the pile keep the material connected to the drill and do not allow the operator to put the pin (male thread) into the female coupler without a high percentage of cross threaded connections.
The APE material is produced under the most stringent standards in the world. APE’s supplier is API ISO certified and API certified for threading and welding on the high strength DOM casings used by APE. These casings have yields of 80,000 psi to 110,000 psi and a wall thickness of min .400 on all size ranges. You cannot produce this material without these certifications. APE’s global reach and buying power allows us to bring this material to market at prices competitive to products of far less quality.
High Pressure Grouting
APE is introducing true high pressure grouting at the tip of the pile. This can be accomplished with a push out tip that is currently approved by Caltrans as a micro-pile or using ports located at the pile tip to grout while installing. Grouting pile with helical flights gives dramatic improvements in load capacity even in poor soils.
Excavator Mounted Helical Pile Drivers
APE is pioneering excavator mounted drills that handle the pile from the ground and easily connect threaded sections. These high power systems (up to 400,000 ft lbs of torque) are powerful fast systems that show up to the job ready to work after unloading from the trailer. No more power unit, this is self-contained and these drills can be attached to rental equipment in a couple hours with no intrusion into the electrical or hydraulic systems of the excavator. APE has drills for excavators from 28,000 lb class to the biggest machine you can find.
Large OD Helical Pile
APE has developed large diameter shafts up to 42″ in diameter with 1″ wall 80,000 yield DSAW pipe. These large helical are helping designers overcome the endangered species issues that are crippling steel pile driving in marine environments.
Ground Loop Technology
This technology works with standard ground source heat pumps (GSHP) and allows the Helical Pile Foundation to be the ground loop. By heating and cooling the building with the most efficient green energy technology on the market, the foundation qualifies for a 10% on commercial, and 30% on residential tax credit. The foundation will also pay for itself in energy savings in just a few years.
Remote access with the excavator mounted equipment, high capacities with pressure grouting, unparalleled low overhead access and deep drives with the threaded connections, the first material and equipment made for helical pile, socket drive technology, large OD pile that do not endanger marine life. Engineering that fits into the mainstream of the geophysical engineering world, and foundations that heat and cool the building with technology that the DOE dubbed “The no#1 green technology for the 21st century” APE has changed the face of helical piles and deep foundations.
