T58 – 2nd TBM for Mumbai Metro Line-3 Arrives at Mumbai Port

Parts of TBM T58, a Ø6.68m dual-mode tunnel boring machine, made a touch-down at Mumbai Port this Saturday after getting shipped from Terratec’s plant in Guangzhou, China.

The 817 tonne TBM successfully passed factory acceptance testing (FAT) in July 2017 and will be deployed by the Hindustan Construction Company – OSJC Moscow Metrostroy JV along with another TBM (currently being manufactured) to build twin tunnels on the 33.5 km Line-3’s 4.049 km package UGC-02 (Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminal Station – Mumbai Central’s TBM receiving shaft). Both machines are planned to be operated by Terratec’s skilled staff from Thailand, as witnessed earlier during Delhi Metro Phase 3’s tunneling works.

MMRCL’s MD Ashwini Bhide had this to say in a press release:

Completing Factory Acceptance Tests (FATs) for almost all the 17 TBMs, we welcome the arrival of Metro III’s second tunnel boring machine. The TBM will allow soft, wet, hard or unstable ground to be tunnelled with speed and safety. For safe construction and reducing the impact on the surrounding environments, we are using a technology that will be applied by implementing a real-time monitoring and safety evaluation system to track the process during excavation

TBM’s erector getting hoisted up from within the freighter

Offloaded at Mumbai Port

Cutterhead getting hoisted onto an 80 wheel trailer – Photo Copyright: Mehul Thakkar

Photo Copyright: MMRCL

Photo Copyright: MMRCL

Over the next two months, the TBM’s parts will be lowered one by one into the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST) Station’s northern end in Azad Maidan, and re-assembled for the start of tunneling works in November.

Some images of excavation –

CST Station (view large) – Photo Copyright: Abhijeet Chaudhary

CST Station (view large) – Photo Copyright: Abhijeet Chaudhary

More information and images of this TBM, shot during FAT in China, can be viewed here.

As of today 9 out of 17 TBMs have completed FAT – see a running list at the bottom of this post.

For more updates, check out the Mumbai section of The Metro Rail Guy!

– TMRG