This is the drill used for the SH 1 tunnel from Waiwera going north to Puhoi, New Zealand. Drilling commences from the North end, drilling towards Waiwera. Starts formally on 20th Feb. 2006.
Drill machine. runs on 3Ø 1050 Volts ac:
Name-plate details from supply transformer:
Drill bit, about 1.2 meters in diameter, note water jets for cooling:
I gotta ask... is that drill head decorated? Or is there a purpose for all those welded-on lines and dots?.
Them lines are what what is known in the welding trade as hard-facing. It's put on there to postpone wear to the actual surface of the cutting head. Excavator buckets and bulldozer blades typically have the same thing. It's done by running a bead of weld from a special hard-facing welding rod all over the surface to build it up.
Although the drill is pretty big, not as large as a roadyway tunnel.
Another little light just blinked on. Just this past week we started twin tunnel boring in East Los Angeles. We have 2 TBM's (tunnel boring machines), each about 21' diameter. I'll see if I can get some pictures together during the week.
Radar
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