not for use at home

[angledge]

One of the engineers from our Sacramento office just sent me some photos of the largest earth mover in the world.




Specifications:

• The mover stands 311 feet tall and 705 feet long.
  
• It weighs over 45,500 tons.
  
• Cost $100 million to build.
  
• Took 5 years to design and manufacture ...
  
• ... and another 5 years to assemble. 
  
• 5 people are required to operate the mover.
  
• The bucket wheel assembly is over 70 feet in diameter with 20 buckets, each of which can hold over 530 cubic feet of material. 
  
• It can remove over 76,455 cubic meters each day. (100,000 large dump trucks at 40 yds. each)

The mover was built by the German company, Krupp, and is used in an open-pit coal mine.

Comments

[chaosvizier.livejournal.com]

I want one.

[kwokj.livejournal.com]

ditto

[fragbert.livejournal.com]

Apt musical choice.

If I were in that red van in picture #1, I'd think that H.G. Wells (and Orson Welles!) were on to something.

Then, of course, I'd be holed up in a bunker somewhere in Montana with lots of canned chili and guns.

And air freshener.

[marasca.livejournal.com]

This makes me wonder what the biggest piece of machinery ever build was.

[angledge.livejournal.com]

This was described as the largest earth mover in the world. Offhand, I can't think of any machine that could reasonably be larger.

[angledge.livejournal.com]

Well, for $100 million, Krupp will happily build one for you. Ready for delivery in 2015.

[angledge.livejournal.com]

According to the email I got, the reason the thing is driving over a German highway is because it's easier to drive the thing from the manufacturing facility to its final destination than to assemble it in place. Its top speed is 0.33 mph.

[marasca.livejournal.com]

That's what I was thinking. Then again I had never seriously considered that there might be earth movers bigger than the ones they use for making buildings. For all I know there's a 500 ft circular saw somewhere out there. ;)

[aitkendrum.livejournal.com]

Now we know never to upset you!

actually I thought of one

[angledge.livejournal.com]

Well, if a ship qualifies as a "machine". An aircraft carrier would be larger than this thing.

Re: actually I thought of one

[marasca.livejournal.com]

I wonder if a ship would qualify. I'd say the engine would be a machine, as would other parts, but not the ship itself? Or maybe the whole "make it go" mechanism would be a machine?

In any case the human ability to build huge things is pretty amazing (and scary).

[sskipstress.livejournal.com]

Will it make coffee??

[angledge.livejournal.com]

Since the thing requires a staff of five, I think it's reasonable to include a coffee maker. Krupp might know a thing or two about building one of those.

[angledge.livejournal.com]

That would be true, if I owned that monstrosity. But I don't. Then again, it can only move at 0.33 mph, so you'd definitely be able to outrun me if I were to pursue you in it. Then again, again, I'd totally be able to destroy your back garden.

[sskipstress.livejournal.com]

It's almost as if it would just as easy to build the factory on the site, then disassemble the factory when it's built. And I bet that thing could wreck a factory pretty quickly.

Re: actually I thought of one

[sskipstress.livejournal.com]

Guinness World Records web site sez:

Largest Scientific Instrument
The world's largest scientific instrument (and arguably the world's largest machine) is the Large Electron Positron Collider. It is a circular tube 3.8 m (12 ft 6 in) in diameter and 27 km (17 miles) in circumference. It is situated in a giant donut-shaped tunnel 100 m (330 ft) below the area around the Swiss-French border in Geneva. The machine began operating in 1989 and was officially closed down at 8 am on November 2, 2000. It was used to examine the smallest particles of matter by accelerating electrons and positrons that collided with each other. The collisions produced tiny sub-atomic particles and enabled physicists to study the fundamental nature of the universe.

Re: actually I thought of one

[marasca.livejournal.com]

That does seem to take the cake.

Wacky!

Re: actually I thought of one

[ataralas.livejournal.com]

LEP is being turned into the Large Hadron Collider which will turn on in 2007. It extends it by about another 1km and adds a bunch of functionality.

I work there. (at least for the summer)

Re: actually I thought of one

[angledge.livejournal.com]

*waves to you in Switzerland*
Stay out of the way of all those speeding subparticles, OK?!?!

Re: actually I thought of one

[marasca.livejournal.com]

Pray tell what a Hadron is. Is it one of those things that wasn't discovered yet when I was in 11th grade chemistry?

Re: actually I thought of one

[chaosvizier.livejournal.com]

Whatever it is, we know that Brian's older than it.

[blu-matt.livejournal.com]

When you said "earth mover", I was expecting something more like this:



Not sure I got the lips quite right though. Too much lipstick?

[angledge.livejournal.com]

Words fail me.

[blu-matt.livejournal.com]

:)

[thereject.livejournal.com]

Holy crap, last night I was having a discussion with my rommate about those very pictures and I couldn't find them when I went to look for them.

I have one where one of those gigantic dump trucks accidentally parked on an F150.


I have another where one of those gigantic dump trucks got picked up by the scoop and crushed like an egg.

[thereject.livejournal.com]

Also, you might want to be gentle on the poor dial-up users and switch your images out with thses ones:
http://thereject.socialreject.net/pictures/pit.jpg
http://thereject.socialreject.net/pictures/mover.jpg
http://thereject.socialreject.net/pictures/upclose.jpg
Total combined size: 148k
Your bitmaps make modems sad :(

[angledge.livejournal.com]

Done & done. Thanks for the jpgs.

Re: actually I thought of one

[ataralas.livejournal.com]

::waves back::

Alas, I have not started work yet, but I will remember this when I start!

Re: actually I thought of one

[ataralas.livejournal.com]

A hadron is something made out of quarks. So, for example, a proton or a neutron. But also more exotic things like kaons and pions and sigmas, etc.

So they were discovered when you were in 11th grade Chem, but they just didn't tell you about them.

[funkyplaid.livejournal.com]

You know, that thing is SOME impressive, archaic-looking behemoth. Last time I saw anything like it was when the Orks were riding around on something similar during a rousing game of Adeptus Titanicus.

Krupp or Games Workshop?

*geekin'*

[funkyplaid.livejournal.com]

Then again, I'd totally be able to destroy your back garden.

Heheh.

[funkyplaid.livejournal.com]

Actually, it could be the start of some wacky German plot to start WWIII.

'Oont now, vee haff zee Panzerkampfwagen VII – Der Scarenzeepoopoutofyoo!'

[blu-matt.livejournal.com]

You'd think they'd have learned their lesson after two thrashings...

[http://users.livejournal.com/-j0k3r-/]

It only takes 5 people to operate you say?? Should be simple to take joyriding. *falls into day dream with happy, drooling expression*

[spymunster.livejournal.com]

Man, I hope that thing doesn't tip over... :-)

[angledge.livejournal.com]

That makes you the THIRD person on my flist to reference Warhammer.

...

But the first geeky enough to actually post the thought. ;-)

5, you say?

[angledge.livejournal.com]

you
me
chaosvizier
funkyplaid
sskipstress (she can make us coffee!)

I'm ready when you are.

Actually ...

[angledge.livejournal.com]

... I got these photos as part of a health & safety presentation. Apparently the earth mover isn't in much danger of tipping over, but it does have dangerous cannibalistic tendencies ....



It eats its smaller brethren!

Re: actually I thought of one

[fizrep.livejournal.com]

And shorter.

[eitheror.livejournal.com]

I have one. You can borrow it.

[angledge.livejournal.com]

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