Jackets

IHC Hydrohammers have been used for decades for the installation of Jackets in the Oil & Gas Industry. Jackets are steel structures which are positioned on the seabed and designed to support oil platforms above the water. The Hydrohammer starts playing her role during the installation when the jacket is positioned on the seabed and the piles are stabbed in the piles sleeves. After the piles are driven in the seabed to the required penetration the piles will be connected to the jacket. In this way a reliable foundation has been created with the help of an IHC Hydrohammer. 

The Hydrohammer is famous for its easy handling when freely hanging, because of its favourable energy/weight ratio and the Hydrohammer gives 100% of its potential energy in all positions, even horizontally.  These features makes the Hydrohammer extremely suitable for driving jackets because of  the battered piles and freehanging driving position.

The size of jackets installed with a Hydrohammer covers the complete range, from very small to very big jackets. The small jackets are installed in water depths from about 5 meters. For these smaller jackets the piles are normally stabbed through the legs of the jacket and the IHC Hydrohammer operates above the waterline.

In the picture below a small jacket is installed with piles with a diameter of 48”, a length of 25 meter and a weight of 20 Mt. For this Project an IHC S-90 Hydrohammer has been used.

The largest jacket ever installed has also been installed by using an IHC Hydrohammer. This jacket has been installed in a water depth of 400 meter and for this project our largest IHC S-2300 Hydrohammer has been used. The piles for this jacket have a diameter of 108”, a length of 190 meter and a weight of 900 Mt. In the pictures below the up-ending process of one pile from the transportation barge to a vertical position is shown. The dual crane heavy lift vessel Thialf is the largest vessel of her kind with a combined capacity of 14.200 Mt, this also shows the shear size of the piles.

The piles for the largest jacket are driven subsea with the
IHC S-2300 Hydrohammer which is shown on the picture above.

S-750 at work in Vietnam

 
Most recent delivery of an IHC Hydrohammer specially for jacket installation was an S-1200 model. In March 2006 Dutch offshore contractor Seaway Heavy Lifting (SHL) ordered the Hydrohammer with ballast and 84” offshore sleeve.

“It runs like a clock”

These were the words of IHC Hydrohammers Dutch client Seaway Heavy Lifting from Zoetermeer when they were operating the IHC S-1200 Hydrohammer on her first project in India.