Thursday 3rd July 2025
Project Overview
Our team recently delivered a highly specialised lifting solution within a pharmaceutical plant room, highlighting our expertise in custom design and installation.
The project involved:
- Four custom-fabricated monorail beams, each designed to suit the existing structural steelwork and tight plant room layout.
- Four Verlinde VX5 electric chain hoists, each supplied with a wireless remote control for safe and precise operation.
- Full integration with existing services, avoiding clashes with critical ducting, pipework, and other equipment.
This project demonstrates our commitment to delivering tailored, high-quality lifting solutions for complex industrial and pharmaceutical facilities. By working closely with the client and engineering teams, we overcame challenging spatial and technical constraints while ensuring compliance with strict plant standards.
The result is a reliable, user-friendly overhead system that supports ongoing maintenance activities and enhances overall operational efficiency within the plant.
The Challenge
The client, a leading pharmaceutical manufacturer, was expanding their operations to include new glycol skid units within an already highly utilised plant room. While these additions were essential for improving production capacity and efficiency, they also introduced a significant logistical challenge: safely handling and maintaining large, heavy components within a restricted space.
The plant room was a complex environment, tightly packed with critical infrastructure, including ducting, pipework, electrical trays, and other essential services. This left very little room to install traditional lifting systems such as overhead cranes or gantries.
The plant room was a complex environment, tightly packed with critical infrastructure, including ducting, pipework, electrical trays, and other essential services. This left very little room to install traditional lifting systems such as overhead cranes or gantries.
Key challenges faced by the client included:
- Limited spatial availability, making it impossible to use standard lifting equipment without major structural modifications.
- Strict hygiene and safety requirements, with all materials and finishes needing to comply with pharmaceutical industry regulations.
- Need for uninterrupted operations, as the plant had to remain fully functional throughout the installation, with no impact on production schedules.
- Manual handling risks, as the glycol skid components are both heavy and awkward to manoeuvre, posing potential hazards for maintenance personnel.
- Future accessibility, ensuring that maintenance teams could safely and efficiently carry out inspections and repairs without introducing new risks or delays.
The client required a highly customised, reliable lifting solution that could integrate seamlessly with existing services while providing safe, controlled movement of heavy components. Addressing these challenges called for precise planning, innovative design, and close collaboration with the client’s engineering and safety teams to develop a tailored solution that met all operational and regulatory demands.
Our Solution
To address the client's complex requirements, we developed a fully customised lifting solution tailored specifically to the confined plant room environment. Our team designed and fabricated four individual monorail beams, each precisely engineered to integrate with the existing overhead steel structure without disrupting critical services.
Key aspects of our solution included:
Custom-fabricated monorails, designed to fit seamlessly within tight spatial constraints.
Verlinde VX5 electric chain hoists, chosen for their compact design, reliability, and smooth handling capabilities.
Wireless remote controls, enabling operators to manage lifts safely from a distance, reducing manual handling risks.
Corrosion-resistant finishes, ensuring long-term durability and compliance with pharmaceutical hygiene standards.
Careful planning and coordination were critical throughout the project. Our team worked closely with the client’s engineering and safety teams to ensure that installation could proceed without interrupting plant operations. Every beam and hoist was installed and tested to meet stringent safety and operational requirements.
By delivering a solution that combined precision engineering with practical usability, we helped the client achieve safe, efficient maintenance capabilities for their glycol skid units, ultimately supporting smoother operations and improved staff safety.