Skip to main content

This runway builder perfected paving and landed remarkable results

This busy airport needed a complete runway renovation without disrupting daily scheduled take-offs and landings. Each workday, construction could start no sooner than 11pm and couldn’t end a minute past 6am. Without state-of-the-art technology from Trimble—including 3D machine guidance—and expert training from SITECH, this complex and high-precision project would've never got off the ground.
August 31, 2023 Read time: 2 mins
This Runway Builder Perfected Paving and Put 25% More in Their Pocket

 

The Luxembourg Airport, located in Findel, is a major cargo destination in Europe. Along with ever growing passenger traffic, the airport’s one runway is 4 kilometres long and 60 metres wide—and was in need of complete renovation and repair after 30 years of operation in order for it to meet international standards.

Click here to watch the video

Airport operators needed a way to complete the runway reprofile without disrupting daily scheduled take-offs and landings. With an eye on speed, flexibility and quality, the operators opted to essentially build a new runway with different asphalt layers over the existing one. The idea was that milling machines would rectify the profile of the track while the asphalt pavers would apply the asphalt necessary to reach the desired level each night, reopening each morning for normal airport operations to resume.

“It was not possible to carry out this project without 3D machine control, with a classic workflow,” explains Christophe Latteur, with Karp-Kneip Construction. “We knew Trimble equipment and how it worked.” He continues, “Embracing 3D machine guidance—even in this particularly demanding context, everyone knows where he has to go, how he has to get there and what he has to do.”

A single Trimble MT900 Machine Target of the milling machine is supplemented by a Trimble GS420 Machine Control sensor. A manual control of the milled depth makes it possible to check the dimension and to validate the quantities of asphalt to be laid afterwards.

It’s a high-precision, highly complex mission with no room for delays—but it worked out. The operation was made possible thanks to a skilled team, 3D machine guidance, state-of-the-art technology from Trimble and the support and training provided by SITECH France, the local Trimble distributor. 

Click here to watch the video

Content produced in association with Trimble

For more information on companies in this article

boombox1
boombox2