In the construction industry, piles are long, slender elements that are made from materials like metal, concrete and wood in order to improve the strength of a structure and reinforce its weight to the stronger soil that is located deep within the earth. Specialist equipment is required in order to install these piles correctly and safely. Let’s take a look at some of the equipment used in piling:
Percussion Drivers
Used in order to deliver an impact blow to the tip of a pile and force it to bypass the softer soil at the surface, percussion drivers are a very effective and common machine used in the piling industry. In fact, the type of soil and pile that is being used helps determine the weight of the hammer and the drop height that will be used. Here are some of the different types of hammers:
Drop Hammer: This style utilises an iron block suspended by a rope which is dropped from a rig in order to deliver the impact blow required.
Air Hammer: This type of hammers comes in a single-acting or double-acting format. The former is semi-automatic and uses a falling cylinder that slides up and down a piston whereas the latter uses cast-iron cylinders that are stationary on the pile head as the pile delivers impact blows using compressed air.
Diesel Hammer: Weighing 2 to 6 tonnes, this type of hammer is made up of units that are suspended from a crane. An explosion of gas kick starts the process and a falling cylinder of steel generates the driving action of the equipment necessary.
Hydraulic Drivers
Generally used for sheet piles rather than steel or concrete columns, hydraulic drivers utilise a hydraulic ram in order to push the pile into the ground. These machines are smaller in size and don’t require a very big drop height in comparison to percussion drivers.
Vibratory Drivers
As the name suggests, vibratory drivers literally vibrate the piles in order to reduce ground resistance and allow the column to smoothly pass into the ground. A high or low frequency can be used depending on the type of soil; however, a vibratory driver is not suitable for use in clay as the vibrations are often reduced.
Piling is used in order to transfer the load of a structure into the deep, strong soil below the earth, bypassing the weak soil on the surface. With this said, this cannot be done by hand so it is important that a team has high-quality equipment on hand in order aid the installation process in a safe and secure manner. Here at Rhino Piling, we use a variety of different piece of equipment in order to complete our piling, mini-piling and groundworks projects. To find out more information, get in contact with the best piling Manchester has to offer and speak to a member of the team today!
