Supplying low voltage switchboards to facilitate temporary power for a rectangle tunnel boring machine at the Kai Tak Development, Hong Kong.
Background:
Contracted by a leading infrastructure company in Hong Kong, we provided customised low voltage switchboards to allow a connection of 2 x 1400kVA and 1 x 600kVA generators with an auto synchronisation function for temporary power to a rectangle tunnel boring machine at their Kai Tak Development, situated between residential homes, a school and a main road.
Solution:
In usual circumstances, an application for permanent or temporary power would be made to the local power distributor. In this case, the project timeline was short, making temporary power generators the most effective solution. Power distribution boards were also supplied for powering the site’s lighting, hand tools and other equipment, including a customised quick connection box which uses the quick released sockets and plugs topology. This quick connection box allows power cables to be quickly disconnected and re-connected without termination from the tunnel boring machine while crews expand the existing tunnel using segments.
Terminations, testing, commissioning and power up of our systems for the tunnel boring machines were also in the scope of works.
Outcome:
Some of the successful outcomes of this project included:
- A first for Ampcontrol, supplying power to and work on, a rectangle tunnel boring machine.
- Provision of off grid power to allow a geographically challenging project to remain on a very tight schedule.
- The downtime and safety features of using quick connection sockets and plugs outweighed the alternative of physically disconnecting and terminating the cables each time a new segment had to be installed.
