Wang Jin, Kuang Zhanting

China's first set of remote control crane for offshore oil unmanned platform developed and designed by CSSC South China Marine Machinery for Kenli 6-1 Oilfield of CNOOC Tianjin Branch has completed the trial production of the prototype and remote control console, and successfully completed the first test acceptance. All the land test data have fully met the requirements of the customer. In the next step, the product will undergo offshore cross-platform joint commissioning.

It took 22 years for South China Marine Machinery to follow the world offshore platform crane technology development trend from the complete blank.

Continue to overcome difficulties and achieve "made in China"

Offshore platform crane is a crane used on the offshore platform, which is used for the cargo handling and lifting personnel to the platform. It is one of the most important production and safety equipment in the offshore oil production. Offshore platform cranes were monopolized by a few developed manufacturing countries such as Europe and the United States, and China had to rely on foreign imports. An ordinary offshore platform crane then cost $1 million. How many platforms and operating ships were there in an offshore oil field? How many $1 million was needed? This was not only a heavy cost burden, but also a technical obstacle for China's offshore oil industry, which was committed to increasing the proportion of proprietary development.

How far is the technology getting stuck? At that time, there was no precedent for the design and manufacture of offshore platform cranes or national standard in China, and international standards must meet the API standards. Over the years, based on the technical route of digestion and absorption of independent research and development as well as continuous optimization and improvement, South China Marine Machinery has not only broken the foreign enterprise monopoly in offshore platform crane, but also possessed autonomously controllable mechanical-electrical-liquid integrated lifting control technology and obtained licensing of a number of national patents by continuously upgrading and applying all kinds of new materials and new processes, with applicable sea conditions expanding from shallow sea areas to super deep water areas of more than 1500 m.

For requirements of ocean use environment and oil development activities, South China Marine Machinery’s offshore platform crane product serial design has covered and met requirements from small tonnage + low maintenance of small four-leg unmanned platforms to large tonnage + 24-hour long-term continuous drilling operation safety lifting of 8-leg-andabove large and medium-size platforms and super deep water equipment of more than 1500 m water depth. Moreover, with the increasingly mature R&D and manufacturing technology, South China Marine Machinery continues to improve the modular and lightweight design of offshore platform cranes, and constantly improved the durability, reliability and maintenance convenience of the products, providing a strong guarantee for the timely operation and safe operation of many offshore oil and gas field development projects in China.

Win the market with technology, quality and service

With the first-mover advantage of technology, South China Marine Machinery has now become the "single champion" in the field of offshore platform crane with the first delivery record in China. In 2021 alone, South China Marine Machinery has completed and delivered 30 sets and signed 40-set contracts. So far, South China Marine Machinery supplied more than 830 sets of crane equipment for all kinds of offshore eingineering equipment at home and abroad, including 1500 m deep water pipe-laying ship, the “Deepsea 1” semi-submersible platform, "CNOOC Oil 201" and other national key projects, with a lifting capacity range of 10t-300t, domestic market share of more than 80%, ranking first in China and in the forefront in the world.

South China Marine Machinery which started from scratch in the offshore platform crane sector did not even have a CNC lathe in 2000, gear processed from equipment in the 1960s have a very low qualification rate. The factory supervision team checked with the user's eyes and rejected many gears under the offennding pressure. The "stupid method" of putting strain patch testing was applied in the stress testing of the first product, trying every means in more than 20 days in covering all key stress parts such as crane jib head, middle of the crane jib, root of the crane jib and root of the tripod and connecting the signal line of nearly 100 m long for each strain patch.

Now, South China Marine Machinery adopts the modular assembly production methode, with the CNC processing center, CNC feeding and automatic welding equipment and other hardware constantly put into use, the product fabrication level has been substantially improved, not only fully guaranteeing the product quality, but also effectively shortening the production cycle. Compared with imported mainstream brand products, the delivery time of offshore platform crane products of South China Marine Machinery is shortened by more than 1/3.

At present, the crane aftersales network of South China Marine Machinery covers the whole country and radiates to the whole world. The technical service team provides the lifelong after-sales service of products and the maintenance, rectification and upgrading services of other cranes as well as digital service files and spare parts inventory to guarantee the product tracking services and emergency response.

It is duty-bound to boost deepsea development

In April 2000, South China Marine Machinery completed the first offshore platform crane with a lifting capacity of 15 tons and a lifting height of 20 m. The products delivered in that year were one 60 ton offshore platform crane of Shengli Oilfield Shallow Sea Oilfield Project and nine 15 ton offshore platform cranes of CNOOC Wenchang & Qinhuangdao Oilfield Project. In recent years, the lifting capacity of the offshore platforme crane products of South China Marine Machinery has reached 300 tons and has a lifting height of 30 m, gradually moving towards large scale, serialization and standardization.

Breaking the monopoly position of foreign enterprises in offshore platform cranes is only the stage achievement of South China Marine Machinery’s streneous efforts in the field. Today, after more than 20 years, with the national exploration and development of ocean energy sources to the ultradeep water area of more than 1500 m in the South China Sea, the large-scale, deepwater and intelligent offshore engineering equipment requirements are becoming increasingly high, and supporting crane products also need to greatly improve the deep water operation performance and information control level. How to break through the core control technology of deepwater lifting equipment? How to break through the technical barriers of a few manufacturers in developed countries in Europe and the United States and realize the independent control of key technologies? South China Marine Machinery has embarked on a new journey.

It is the development vision of South China Marine Machinery to become the world technology front runner in offshore engineering equipment. On the new journey of high-quality development, South China Marine Machinery will continue to make deep efforts in the field of offshore platform cranes, bravely shoulder the mission, and make more and greater contributions to the development and security of national ocean energy resources.