Cost Effective solution for large wire rope installations

A wealth of spooling experience has been developed in recent years by supplying and supporting operations across projects located around the world including, US, Gulf of Mexico, Canada, Brazil, West Africa, India, UK North Sea and Norwegian Continental Shelf (NCS). Through its experience in handling large diameter, high tonnage wire rope installations ACE Winches has built up a solid understanding of the type of equipment operators and service companies require for spooling projects. The company has an appreciation that not every two projects are the same, and some require bespoke designed equipment.    ACE Winches have a range of standard spooling winches readily available for use on spooling operations, all of which may need to be supplemented with more specialised or bespoke products that collectively facilitate the installation or removal of wire rope, rope or umbilicals from the winches to storage reels all under constant back tension.

The spooling winches and traction spooling systems are designed, engineered and manufactured in-house to address the market requirements. The spooling winches rotate reels of wire, rope or umbilicals with the removable shafts acting as an axle which can accommodate various diameters of reels. The axle runs through a hole in the centre of the reel, catering for reel weight capacities ranging from 50te to 400te.  The winches can be diesel, electric or pneumatically driven and those of 50te capacity or higher are designed with an integrated power system, which has the added benefit of reducing deck space.

Original manufacturer’s reels are not necessarily designed to support back tension, likewise spooling winches also have limitations. To overcome this problem, the spooling winch can be coupled with a traction spooling winch.  The manufacturer’s reel that contains the product is installed onto the spooling winch and the traction winch is then used to generate the high back tension required to spool the product onto the client’s equipment.

The ACE Winches traction winch has been designed to work on friction drive mechanism and is engineered so that it is capable of generating a spooling back tension of up to 90te. To generate this back tension only a minimum tension needs to be applied on the manufacturer’s spooling drum.

With more than 20 years hands-on experience, ACE Winches highlights some key project profiles where it has been called on to deliver. 

The company supported a client to give them the ability to spool 3000m of 128mm wire with 60te back tension onto the winch of an active heave compensator (AHC) deck crane on a high capacity construction support vessel (CSV). The vessel was built for heavy construction work and had been mobilised to work on a subsea construction project.  A range of equipment was supplied to accommodate this requirement which included: 300te WLL Diesel Hydraulic Spooling Winch and 60te WLL Capstan Traction Winch.  

The client, as a result, was able to save approximately two weeks vessel project time by spooling wire this way. The alternative option was to sail to deep water, pay out all the wire and spool it on again in order that it could achieve enough tension on the crane drum.

Spooling jobs take place around the world, so having access to a skilled and specialised team on the ground to support the client can be invaluable. Having an experienced team as part of the operation can also be an efficient way of managing the project.  Operating offshore in Brazil and West Africa, a request was received for the design, engineering and manufacture of bespoke spooling winches for a leading oil and gas company to enable them to conduct spooling operations on several of its vessels working in those waters.  Several 250te capacity diesel hydraulic winches, that also included level wind units, were required for the vessels. The equipment was designed and manufactured to meet the exact client requirements. 

An oil and gas subsea company needed to spool umbilical with a low braking load.  A 250te spooling winch was designed, engineered and manufactured in-house to meet this requirement.  The winch had a low tensioner render function, and incorporated a hydraulic change from 2-speed to 3-speed.   The equipment was deployed and the unit was utilised on a range of additional projects, predominantly located in offshore Brazil and offshore Africa.

Supporting rigs in India had a different requirement. The drilling company wanted a solution that could work in harsh weather conditions experienced in the Indian Ocean, from high temperatures to tropical storms with the capability of being able to manage reels up to 6.2m diameter.    The solution was to deploy a 200te diesel hydraulic spooling winch designed and manufactured, the reels were powered by an ACE constant tension gear driven unit, retractable via a hydraulic arm that would allow for safe unloading and loading of reels. The unit had a telescopic base frame that could be extended by 2.5m enabling the client to accommodate reels that were up to 6.2m. The unit was fitted with four stabiliser arms designed to provide stability during harsh weather conditions.  

In a recent example the spooling formed an integral part a much larger project, the overall contract was to supply a 10 point mooring system to a vessel that was to be mobilised from Singapore to Alaskan waters.  The spread was mobilised and a team was supplied to the client to get the kit onto the vessel and, as part of the project, to spool all the wire ropes.  A range of equipment was supplied, including hydraulic drum mooring winches, power units, load and tension monitoring and vessel bridge control. 

Spooling winches and traction winches were used to support a client in managing the replacement of 3400m of 128wire onto a 400te crane. The wire rope had to be first initially spooled off to the winches on board the vessel and the crane wire had to be replaced by a new one and scheduled so that the job took place between two projects and at a location which was on the vessel’s sailing route. ACE Winches assisted with the project management prior to the actual spooling to ensure that it could be completed on schedule.  There was a total of six personnel dedicated to the project working a 24 hour operation.

Project Overview:

• Equipment mobilised on the vessel deck and reel lifted from quayside to spooling winch, reel weighed 310te
• Spooled off old wire rope, 2700m onto the vessel’s main winch, with the spooling going through traction winch located on aft of deck
• 3400m of 128mm wire spooled onto the crane with 60te back tension
• New sockets installed to the wire and certified
• Old wire spooled onto reel and moved off the vessel
• Spooling winch relocated on deck and reel containing 1500m of working wire lifted from quayside to vessel
• Spooling continued as the vessel was carrying out tests offshore

A recent project in US Gulf of Mexico was for the installation of large wire rope onto four 250te cranes.  The large wire rope measured 3800m of 100mm diameter wire rope, and each reel weighed 208te.  A combination of 225te diesel hydraulic spooling winch and a 60te hydraulic traction winch were mobilised for the project.