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Back in April APE attended the PDCA Annual International Conference and Expo from April 25 -27th. During the conference APE was given the honor of receiving the project of the year award for projects over 5 million. The project APE received the award for was the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge where the OctaKong Vibratory Driver Extractor was used to drive the 72″ perimeter piles for the reclaimed islands. The OctaKong has finished the two island and has been taken apart into 8 Super Kong Vibratory Driver Extractors and is being used in multiple ways throughout the foundation work of the bridge. We want to send a big thanks out to everyone who made the project a reality, and to the PDCA for noticing our companies largest accomplishment to date.

APE was given the opportunity to present at DFI’s 2012 Superpile on the benefits, challenges and complexities of driving large diameter piles. The presentation was given by David White, the Managing Director of APE China. Along with Steve Gough, the APE China team and APE Corporate team, we all made the foundation work of Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge a reality. They worked tirelessly to design, negotiate and deliver the “OctaKong”, the largest Vibratory Driver Extractor to ever be seen on planet earth.

David White wrote an article back in December detailing the role that APE and our team played in constructing the foundation for the reclaimed islands of the bridge, this was after the final pile had been driven. During the process we have written several more articles with details on the construction of the bridge and APE’s continued involvement. We look forward to what future projects will bring with the benefits seen through the use of large diameter piles.

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Below are the links to all of the articles we have written over the past year on the OctaKong and the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge:

• Final 72′ Pile Driven to Grade, OctaKong Project Finished
• APE Drives the World’s Largest Pile!
• APE China Successfully Drove the World’s Largest Sheet Pile
• Octakong and the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge
• APE China Successfully Tests Tandem 200-6
• When the Competition Says “They Can Do It”… Talk to Someone Who Has “DONE IT” Call APE!

We owe a big thanks to Shane McWhirk from Peak Oilfield Service and the APE Parts Department for getting us this story and pictures from Prudhoe Bay, Alaska.  The APE 200-6 was used successfully in cold temperatures (-10 F thru -35 F) for driving the piles for Peak Oilfield Service’s job.  The Hydraulic tank was insulated and heated with heat pads that were supplied electricity from a generator.  Permafrost layers are between 6 to 15 feet making driving  some of the toughest a vibratory driver/extractor could encounter.  A 30 year crane operator from Florida that has put thousands of piles in the ground compares the permafrost layers to granite.

The APE 200-6 was recently rented to an experienced customer in HaiKou to drive double “Z” shaped sheet piles for a new dock project. Convincing new customers in China that APE equipment is of the highest quality available is never easy. Many years of competition in the market selling fake products, low quality products, and terrible service has left most contractors extremely weary to trust anybody. Even as a Tall 2.1 meter tall white speaking foreigner in China, it is not enough to fully convince contractors that our product and service is far beyond anything they have experienced in the past. This particular customer has either purchased or rented at some point every single vibratory hammer in China available from electric to hydraulic and local to import. Due to the extreme success of the “Octa-Kong” project for the HongKong-Macao-Bridge project to drive 22m (72 feet) diameter piles he decided to give us a chance. He figured that if we can drive 22m (72 foot) diameter piles we should be able to drive sheet piles. 24 hours prior to us receiving a down payment for a few months rent he received all call from our competitor saying he was making a grave mistake to rent our hammer to him and APE hammers would absolutely not succeed in driving the sheet piles to grade.

Our customer called me on the phone and said he was extremely disturbed by the call. Dan Collins and John White has told APE CHINA several times to rent our hammer for free if we have to prove to the market that we have the best product. I told the customer we would return 100% of the money if our hammer didn’t drive the sheet piles. He was so moved by what I said he said he would send 100% of the money within 20 minutes, he did without any extra modification to the contract. After the hammer arrived on the job site our service man Mr. Liu discovered that all of our engine oil from our Cummins 700 HP engine was gone. We all remember quite clearly doing a full service check of the machine prior to shipment and were shocked to discover that all of the engine oil was mysteriously gone after the first night on the job site. Mr. Liu, being the excellent service man he his, checked all fluid levels prior to initial startup of the power unit of the drive pump lube oil level, hydraulic oil level, radiator fluid level, diesel fuel level, and thank goodness the engine oil level.

After a wasted half day of replacing the engine oil, which we paid for, the hammer finally had the chance to prove it could work. The hammer ended up doing extremely well on the site driving 15 to 20 piles per day easily. Our customer was so happy with our service he wrote a full-page hand written thank you letter to our service man Mr. Liu and to APE for the excellent service given on the job site and high performance of the hammer.  We are extremely happy to represent a product we all believe in, there’s nothing better than selling a product that you know is going to work. Go APE!

The 170VM has driven 1000 sheets since it first started working. The new APE concrete clamp kicks bud! APE China response time to send new set of jaws was only 3 days! Impressive!!! Thank you APE China staff for making it happen. For more details on the Cabo Riviera project see my first article from back in November of 2011 http://www.apevibro.com/wordpress/2011/11/01/ape-170vm-has-been-spotted-in-los-cabos/.

We recently received the 2012 January – February issue of International Construction Magazine, and we are more than pleased to see an article on the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge project where the APE OctaKong was driving the largest diameter piles every driven in history. For those of you unfamiliar with the project, here is a rundown on the scope of the project courtesy of Wikipedia:

“The in-construction Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge is a series of bridges and tunnels that will connect Hong Kong, Macau and Zhuhai, three major cities situated on the Pearl River Delta in southern China. The proposed 50 km (31 mi) link is expected to cost US$10.7 billion.[citation needed] With its length, it would become one of the landmarks within the area. The longest bridge section will be 22.8 km (14.2 mi) long and include three cable-stayed spans between 280 m (920 ft) and 460 m (1,510 ft).[1][2] Construction formally began on 15 December 2009.[3] The bridge is due for completion in 2016.”

David White, Director of Operations of the APE China Office and Manufacturing facility wrote an article back in December detailing the role that APE and our team played in constructing the foundation for the reclaimed islands of the bridge, this was after the final pile had been driven. During the process we have written several more articles with details on the construction of the bridge and APE’s continued involvement. We look forward to helping the Chinese build quality foundations for any of their coming construction projects. Below are the links to all of the articles we have written over the past year on the OctaKong and the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge:

• Final 72′ Pile Driven to Grade, OctaKong Project Finished
• APE Drives the World’s Largest Pile!
• APE China Successfully Drove the World’s Largest Sheet Pile
• Octakong and the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge
• APE China Successfully Tests Tandem 200-6
• When the Competition Says “They Can Do It”… Talk to Someone Who Has “DONE IT” Call APE!

The Seattle Times just posted a news article this morning about the new 520 floating bridge project spanning Lake Washington just east of Seattle. The bridge has been in development for last couple years, with dry dock construction for the pontoon sections taking place in Aberdeen Washington (See Chris Wang’s article on the dry docks here). Construction on the actual bridge site has been in the prepping phases and is now ready for major foundation work which is slated to start next week.

The coming weeks will include huge foundations and concrete spans near shore, twin sloping transition spans that reach down to the lake, floating pontoons, and road decks fastened upon them. APE will be on the scene with a 600 Vibratory Driver extractor, the largest vibratory pile driver in the APE fleet will be pulling the outer casing for 12.5′ drilled shafts. We will also see an APE 200-6 driving the sheet piles for the cofferdams. See the Seattle Times new article here http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2017862072_520bridge29m.html for more details.

Trident Construction recently purchased a new APE D19-42 and leads to add to their piledriving capability.

I recently visited their jobsite to set it up and watched the hammer run flawlessly. Trident is driving pipe piles as part of a Canadian Coast Guard pier reconstruction. APE has been enjoying an increased presence in Canada and look forward to continued expansion of business with our Canadian friends.

San Francisco, the city by the bay. California is steadily rebuilding some of its world renown monuments. Pier 19 located in San Francisco California is one of them. The rebuilding of pier 19 has been long overdue with tourism still in full swing with cruise ships coming and going out of the port. After the demoltion of the pier, the first order of things is, of course, the foundation.

Seen here, Power Engineering of Northern California is antalling 72” diameter steel pipe pile 160’ long with a 1” wall thickness. Driving these steel casings wasn’t going to be easy with all the restrictions enforced on the job. Tight work space with little room to manuever and all the regulations involved made this job a chelleng. So when they decided to take on the job, they called APE to get the equipment they needed. With the tough Merrit Sands and the sticky Bay Mud here in the bay, they chose the APE 600 Vibro to do the job. And of course the 600 vibro wouldn’t let them down, it got the pile down!

Along with the on-going demolition of the Alaska way viaduct, a Seattle landmark second only to the Space Needle, rises a new attraction on Pier 57- a 175-foot-tall Ferris wheel. Pier 57 was originally built in 1902 as a rail-loading facility for a saw mill. Today, it houses a plethora of marine-oriented shops, restaurants, and even an antique carousel. Hal Griffith, owner of Pier 57, fears losing business due to the viaduct replacement and hopes a new waterfront attraction will keep the publics’ interest alive. With the loss of the Fun Forest at the Seattle Center, this will be the only Ferris wheel available in the city. Once completed with 41 air conditioned gondolas, it should prove to be quite an accommodating attraction to locals and tourists alike.

Manson Construction, a major player here in the PNW, was chosen to drive the foundation piles of this soon-to-be “landmark” on the water ward side of the existing pier. With a total of 53- 36” x .5” wall and 30” x .625” wall pipe piles on deck, the Manson crew set out to drive these piles with the APE Super Kong.  What else would you want driving the piles for a 175-foot marine based Ferris wheel, right?

So far, the Manson crew has driven a dozen test piles. With some fine tuning of the equipment to account for the infamous Glacial till the Northwest is known for, the 150’ piles are down to grade. Some were driven only a couple of feet away from the Fisherman’s Restaurant & Bar. Needless to say, some diners became spectators and spectators became diners.  Fair trade.

Today, the Manson crew is running production piles. Most are on 4:1 fore and aft batters. To accommodate the tight driving schedule and the layout of the pile driving grid, APE and Manson teamed up to outfit the Super Kong with a custom vibro sled fit for Manson’s leader system, as well as a custom swing arm pile gate. More pictures and updates to come!