The Billion-Euro Project in Oman

Circular Girder and Custom Formwork for an Ore Processing Plant

“You know it was a good government when it leaves the population in a better state”, were the logical words once spoken by Bill Clinton. In saying this, the most expensive speaker in the world created an inseparable bond between the decision-makers and their responsibility for the welfare of their people.
The Sultan of Oman has transformed his country, which is located on the eastern side of the Arabian Peninsula, into a prosperous and well-regulated state with budget surpluses. The income for this transformation predominantly came from crude oil and natural gas.
So how exactly can an economy with limited resources be successfully restructured? A diversification of various industrial sectors is currently taking place in Oman. This is helping to create as many suitable pillars of income as possible for the future in order to give Oman further protection against possible economic crises.
One of these projects is the settlement of the iron manufacturing industry close to Suhar on the Gulf of Oman.

Suhar

The construction site close to Suhar is several hundred hectares large, making it as big as a small town. Work is being carried out in dozens of areas and hundreds of people are busy carrying out their tasks in their blue overalls. The glistening daylight is often besmirched by haze, making the surroundings very hot and humid. The sky is mostly clear and the sun burns relentlessly. The workers wear a scarf between their helmet and their neck and look for the shade, but to no avail. Every vehicle and every step causes a cloud of fine dust.
A large plant is being conjured up out of the desert floor. This location, where maritime trade has a tradition dating back centuries and energy is cheap – it costs 5 Euros to fill up once the SUV – is now about to welcome a new iron ore processing plant. Next to the site, which is not far away the sea, a new harbour is also being built to accompany the plant.

Organisation

The costs of the major construction project are being covered by the state and privately by the Sultan himself in equal measure and are currently expected to add up to the equivalent of 2.6 billion Euros, making it one of the largest ever construction projects in Oman.

The main contractor is the company Galfar Engineering & Contracting, which has 25,000 employees and is the largest construction company in Oman, that operates main projects all over the Gulf region.
Oman and the Federal Republic of Germany traditionally have extremely positive economic and political relations. This is clearly also the case where this construction site is concerned, with all lorries, excavators and cranes coming from well-known German manufacturers. Many engineering services are also being provided by German companies.

The work is increasingly being measured according to its efficiency and more and more pressure is being piled on the workers to complete important buildings according to schedule. This improves the prospects for high-quality branded products which, despite requiring a rather high initial investment, show a better profitability.

The workers themselves mostly come from India and Pakistan. Their working hours are split into two shifts, each lasting twelve hours.

The Special Feature

The core element of one work area of the plant is a 35 metre high round tower with an outer diameter of 16.35 metres. At the foot of the tower, its walls are up to 1 metre thick and contain external ribs that add to their stability, increasing the wall thickness to 1.50 metres. A steep cone construction made of cast-in-place concrete with an open peak has been installed inside the tower.
A maximum degree of precision was required to construct the tower using high-quality cast-in-place concrete. The cone construction placed heavy demands on the field of form work technology.
The Head of the Galfar Formwork Division, the German Oskar Harter, decided to use the circular TRAPEZoidal girder form work with adjustable radii by PASCHAL.

Formwork Planning

The circular girder formwork was used as climbing formwork. Twelve concreting cycles, each containing 3 high metres of formwork with a section height of 2.95 metres, were intended to produce the perfect result. After four climbing phases, the walls were still 60 cm thick.

Custom formwork was selected for the construction of the protrusions at the tower foot and for the challenging production of the funnel shape at the top.

The TTR formwork was transported from Germany to Oman by sea. All of the engineering services required for the formwork, including assembly fitters and banksmen, came from Germany.

Due to the high temperatures of over 40 degrees Celsius during the day, concreting work was only carried out at night. The concrete factory is located some distance away from the construction site, meaning that a transporter requires approximately one hour travelling between the two locations.

TTR Circular TRAPEZOIDAL Girder Formwork

The TTR circular TRAPEZOIDAL girder form work has the traditional PASCHAL advantage that it can be adjusted to fit the respective area in the system to within a centimetre. This means that no adjustments whatsoever are required from the customer to compensate for any remaining space.
Thanks to its stability, the formwork remains fixed at the desired radius, even if it is repeatedly moved. No time-consuming readjustments or even rear supports whatsoever are required. This does, of course, apply to small radii of 2.50 metres right through to huge radii! The formwork can withstand a fresh concrete pressure of 60 kN/m² with flatness tolerances in accordance with German standard DIN 18202, table 3, line 7.

Summary

The formwork and formwork planning were completely successful. Workers at the construction site faultlessly achieved the expected perfect results with less effort and complexity than normal and within a quicker construction period. Trusting in a branded product was certainly well worth it.