Goliath Portal Crane
Structural Steel Blast and Recoat, Otara
LOCATION
SERVICE
The Challenge
Years of coastal exposure had corroded the crane’s structural steel, leaving a substrate that needed to be stripped back before any new coating could be applied. The crane sat within a live operational site, so the sandblasting work had to proceed without shutting down the surrounding operations or allowing dust or spent media to contaminate the area below the working platform.
Our Approach
BlastOff worked thirteen metres up from scissor lifts to reach the crane’s structural steel members. Enclosed vacuum blasting was chosen for this height and setting, stripping the steel back to a sound, clean substrate while recovering dust and abrasive media as the work progressed rather than allowing it to fall to the site below. This method suited the height of the work and the need to keep operations running underneath, and it prepared the steel for the three-coat protective system applied once blasting was complete.
The Outcome
The crane’s structural steel was returned to a sound, clean condition ready for coating, with no abrasive left within the containment and no disruption to the operations running beneath the work. The prepared substrate gave the following three-coat protective system a reliable surface to bond to, and the crane was returned to service on programme.
Restoring Corrosion Protection 13 Metres Up on the Goliath Portal Crane in Otara
Thirteen metres above the ground at Wilson Group’s Otara site, the structural steel of the Goliath portal crane had spent years absorbing coastal air, and the corrosion showed it. Bringing the crane back to a sound condition meant working from scissor lifts high over a live operational yard, where shutting down surrounding activity or letting dust and spent media fall to the site below simply was not an option.
BlastOff addressed this with enclosed vacuum blasting, a method that strips steel back to a clean, sound substrate while recovering dust and abrasive media as the work progresses rather than releasing it into the air or onto the ground beneath. At height, over an active site, that containment is not a nice-to-have, it is what makes the work possible at all. Once the steel was profiled and clean, a three-coat protective system built for a severe marine environment went on, matched to the exposure the crane faces day to day at a coastal industrial site.
The result was steel returned to a sound, coatable condition with long-life corrosion protection applied and the crane back in service on programme, with no abrasive left inside the containment.
Other owners of cranes, gantries or elevated steelwork in coastal or industrial settings face the same underlying issue: corrosion rarely stays confined to what is visible from the ground, and access and containment often dictate the method as much as the steel condition does. A proper scoping conversation should cover working height, whether the site can keep operating during preparation, and how dust and media will be recovered before commercial sandblasting even begins, so the coating system that follows has a substrate it can actually rely on.
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