Heerema Marine contractors launched a life time extension program for the Balder, one of their deepwater construction vessels. Bakker Sliedrecht played a vital role, working on three key projects of this life time extension program that took place on the Caland Canal in Holland. The three projects were connected with each other, but all had their own responsible contractor. A challenge for Bakker Sliedrecht’s project management: be the linking pin in three complex projects to realize a working end result.
For Huisman, Bakker Sliedrecht was acting as a subcontractor for the electrical hook up of the J-lay installation, which we overhauled and upgraded with Huisman in 2013 and 2014 in Holland. During the Balder’s transit from the Gulf of Mexico to the project location in Holland we already retrofitted all tower related drives and controls on board the vessel. This included renewing the cabling, replacing obsolete parts, overhauling several control panels, and overhauling the fiber optic network.
Together with IHC SAS, Bakker Sliedrecht worked on the electrical hook-up of the pipe handling installation on deck. This installation handles all pipe sections during the welding process before they are loaded into the J-lay pipe installation.
For Heerema, Bakker Sliedrecht extended the life time of the Balder’s main electrical installations. We replaced obsolete components of seven drive systems, renewed multiple power distribution switchboards, and carried out a preventive maintenance program for the Balder’s thruster drive systems. We have also taken care of Lloyd’s 5 year survey of the high voltage distribution, involving the dynamic positioning system.
Both electrical hook-ups had crucial stages which require a lot of demanding jobs done in little time. For this reason, all parties had drawn up an integrated project and execution planning together.
