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APE’s law suit against New England Construction Products for patent infringement of its vibratory pile driver/extractor technology has been settled. “This is one down, eight to go” says John White, President and owner of APE. We still have HPSI, Conmaco, Pile Equipment, J&G Sales, Geoquip, Bay Machinery and ECA and one other supplier yet to be named.

APE settled with New England Construction Products and the terms of the settlement are satisfactory to APE and confidential. Details of the case are a matter of public record.

Notice of Electronic Filing

The following transaction was entered on 10/8/2009 at 2:24 PM EDT and filed on 10/8/2009

Case Name:
American Piledriving Equipment, Inc. v. New England Construction Products, LLC

Case Number:
1:08-cv-11090

Filer:

WARNING: CASE CLOSED on 06/03/2009

Document Number:
41

Docket Text:
Judge William G. Young: ORDER entered.

Manson was faced with driving some 30″x 1″ wall pipe pile 20′ into the Pacific Northwest Glacial Till lens. The APE Model 600 Super Kong was the tool for the job. Manson geared up for the worst; bringing drilling equipment and impact equipment but neither was needed. The Super Kong was able to drive every pile to grade by simply lowering the vibration speed, this allowed the hammer to chew though the tough till lens in roughly 10 minutes.

Malcolm Drilling goes APE when challenged with driving 10′ diameter caissons for the city of Seattle in a low headroom situation. There were a couple of piles on this project where power lines obstructed headroom. At a glance this looked to be a job for the APE “King Kong”, without any suppressor. Dave Yingling, took a second look at the soils and was successful in recommending the APE Model 200-6 with quad beam and low headroom suppressor. This not only made the load lighter, but Malcolm was able to manipulate the pile while in vibration.

Please contact APE @ 800-248-8498 for your special foundation equipment needs.

INSTRUCTORS:

Steve Ried
Ray Heaton

The ongoing support for over a decade, of American Pile Driving Equipment LTD/J&M Foundation Equipment to the British Columbia Institute of Technology’s Pile Driving and Bridgeworker program has always been reliable and provided quality leading edge presentations and training material. The presentations given by Dave Yingling and John White enable the apprentices to work with pile driving equipment from all manufacturers safely and efficiently.

British Columbia Institute of Technology is one of Canada leading polytechnic institutions. BCIT provides hands-on and pragmatic education that is employer-driven, based in technology, and that leads to high quality employment for graduates.

BCIT builds pathways for career success with full-time and part-time studies leading to certificates, diplomas and applied bachelor’s degrees.

The Bridgeworker/Pile Driver Trade is a government certified trade in British Columbia. The Level 3 Bridgeworker/Pile Driver course is only offered at BCIT and is the only government. The Pile Driver/Bridgeworker Trade Qualification Certificate is recognized across Canada. The training provided at British Columbia Institute of Technology covers all aspects of the of:

• pile driving & other deep foundation applications
drain wicks /soil consolidation /drilling
• bridge construction & maintenance
the BC Provincial Ministry of Highways & Transportation mandates that each maintenance district have a certified Pile Driver /Bridgeworkers on the Bridge Crew
• marine construction & maintenance
• formwork /concrete placing & finishing / steel erection / timber construction

British Columbia Institute of Technology training provides the contractors in the industry with a safe, well-trained tradesperson with a get the job done attitude. The contractor will get more bang for their buck from a certified Pile Driver /Bridgeworker.

Names of 1st intake apprentices

Carl Beam
Allan Burnell
Adam Matthison
Curtis Moffatt
Dave Wasstrom

John Dixon
Nikos Fakaro
Robert Kielman
Ron Lafontaine
Jamie Longmuir
Colin McDonald
Devin McKee
Daniel McMurray
Trevor Tuckwell
Brain Wiens
Jason Zoney

The APE Model 250 Variable Moment Hammer was called to duty. Malcolm Drilling was in need of removing a couple of 24″ pipe pile filled with concrete. With APE custom built jaws that simply bolted into a APE 25″ wood clamp, then installed under the APE 250VM, Malcolm was able to make short work of this task with minimum radial vibration.

The superintendent “Chad” noticed one of the benefits of the variable moment feature. There was absolutely no crane boom vibration when the pile was removed and the hammer was phased out. That said, using a hydraulic squirt boom crane will no longer be taboo when using vibratory hammers. Allowing for quick and easy crane set ups saving time and money.

Today history was made. The largest diesel hammer in the world, the APE/SEMW 220, with a ram weight of 22 metric tons was successfully tested and sold to an off shore oil company.

The APE/SEMW D220 diesel hammer is a full two metric tons larger than Delmag’s old Model 200. In addition, the D220 has superior thermal expansion design over the Delmag D200.

APE/SEMW’s marketing strategy is to build larger diesel hammers as a low cost replacement of the much more expensive hydraulic hammers offered by IHC and Menck.

“Diesel hammers have always been superior to hydraulic hammers when it comes to initial cost, parts replacement, simplicity in operation, and actual driving ability.” “The problem has been a lack of a larger diesel hammer to compete with the larger hydraulic hammers. We have solved this by developing these massive new super larger diesel hammers” says John White, President of APE.

APE’s new monster size diesel hammers are changing the way big bridges are being built in the USA and Canada. On the San Francisco Bay bridge, the largest pile job in the USA, all piles are being driven by the APE D180 rather than a European hydraulic hammer. Add to this the fact that Canada’s largest pile project, the Pitt River Bridge, located in Vancouver, BC is also using an APE D180.

Here comes the largest diesel hammer of all, the APE D220. Its first job is to drive piles for an oil project in China. All three of these projects would have been using hydraulic impact hammers if not for the vision of APE.

APE stocks D180 diesel hammers in its USA rental fleet. See a new D180 on display at ConExpo.

Bergerson Construction, from Astoria Oregon are driving 36″ open ended pipe pile in Port Angeles, Washington.

With this set up a contractor can use a section of standard lead with a pile helmet and reduce the overall leader weight by 30% for increased range.

The pin on bell is available for 32″ to 54″ lead. Contact your local APE regional office for more details.

Ray Heaton, the Senior Pile driving/Bridge worker Level 3 Instructor for the British Colombia Institute of Technology generously hosted Dave Yingling, one of the APE Piledriving School Instructors for a one day APE Pile Driving Course.

This course covered an in depth review on the history of vibratory driver/extractors. A driver/extractor hydraulics and mechanics review including maintenance and operations.

The one day course also included reviews of mega pile installation using driver/extractors, bore log evaluation, in depth drivability and driver/extractor troubleshooting including specific jobsite vibratory selecting also a brief view into the present and future trends in vibratory equipment within the industry. The history of diesel hammers. Maintenance and operation of impact atomization and atomized fuel injection single acting diesels were also discussed including the basics on the differences in hydraulic impact, air and diesel hammers.

These apprentices are a “One if a kind” bunch of people who really care about learning the tools of the trade to make their job safer and more efficient.

APE is honored to have these opportunities to aid in the sharing of knowledge. As it is not our first time presenting segments of our free pile driving class for our Canadian Partners at BCIT, every time we have the opportunity to contribute, we know this generation of pile bucks including the next generation will make everyone’s job in the pile driving world a much safer, more informed and efficient one!

I would like to Thank Ray Heaton and all of the apprentices in the class for the many insightful questions. This class was a real treat for me.

For more information on APE’s Pile driving School, log on to www.apevibro.com and select Pile Driving School.

Here at APE, it’s all about the sharing of knowledge which in turn makes all of our jobs safer and more efficient.

APE is proud to have the honor to help make this happen.

Malcolm Drilling is using the APE 170VM to minimize the radial vibration next to the main North South rail line in Downtown Seattle, WA.

The variable moment driver/extractor minimizes the effects of vibration to structures around the driving area by timing two sets of eccentrics to counteract each ther and then phase into time.

Call any of our APE offices for more information.

In the foothills outside Boise Idaho, water management is very important. Summit Excavating is there to take on the challenging jobs.

With very high soil “N” values and very limited access with cranes the Model 200 Vibratory Driver/Extractor is put to work.

With the right piece of equipment anything is possible. The large CAT excavator gives Summit the ability to utilize the versatility of the patented two stage suppressor system on the 200 vibro, greatly minimizing the resonant vibration that is standard in single stage suppressors. With this feature, hydraulic cylinders on excavators and hydraulic cranes are protected from the stiff reaction of a single stage suppressor during start up, shut off and high end bearing soils.

For more information on how APE can fit your foundation needs, contact APE at any of our locations around the world.