Torsional Stability of Offshore Hoists Bridon（扭转海外举起Bridon的稳定）.pdfVIP

Torsional Stability of Offshore Hoists by John M. Walton, B.Sc, C Eng, FIMechE, MBA Consulting Engineer - BRIDON International Ltd The progression of lifting and lowering operations into ever-increasing depths of water has exposed a weakness in the long-established methods of assessing the torsional stability of multi-fall hoists. Instances of “cabling” have been reported on 2-fall hoists despite using “low-rotation” ropes in situations where they were expected to perform satisfactorily. The author explains how assumptions that worked perfectly well when heights of lift were a few hundreds of feet, can no longer be safely applied to Offshore operations in thousands of feet water depth. This article presents a new and more rigorous solution which reveals a secondary influence of height of lift on the torsional stability of multi-fall hoists. The revised theory is used to illustrate the severity of the problem faced by offshore operators and to examine alternative methods of solution. t is now more than 40 years since the issue of torsional stability was first highlighted in the context of I multi-fall crane hoist ropes. At that time high-rise buildings were becom- ing more prevalent and high strength ropes with improved non-rotating properties were still being developed. Consequently there was a pressing need for a better understanding of how and why multi-fall crane reeving sys- tems became torsionally unstable at certain heights of lift, resulting in the characteristic “cabling” together of the rope falls, as shown in Figure 1 (oppo- site page). The response of British Ropes in 1973 was to devise a mathematical method[1] of assessing a given insta