Stainless HEA Beams for Pharmaceutical Overhead Cranes
Structural profiles for warehousing are normally made of carbon steel, so a request for a crane girder in stainless steel already signals a specific set of constraints. A pharmaceutical company needed a 360x300x10x16 mm beam in stainless steel with an overall length of 14.5 metres, to serve as the structural member of an overhead crane inside its warehouse. Montanstahl produced the section by laser welding in 304L, delivering the required length in a way that worked around the limits of raw material availability, and organised the special transport needed to move a bar of that size.
Why a Crane Girder in a Pharma Warehouse Has to Be Stainless
An overhead crane girder is a purely structural component, and in almost any warehouse it would be specified in carbon steel and painted. What changed the answer here is the building it sits in. Pharmaceutical production carries specific requirements that call for stainless steel both for hygienic reasons and because of the substances handled in the space, and those requirements apply to everything above the process, not only to the equipment in contact with the product. A painted carbon steel girder eventually sheds coating and generates rust and iron oxide particles, and in a clean environment that debris is a contamination source falling from the ceiling. Stainless steel removes the problem at the root, which is why crane and monorail girders in pharmaceutical and chemical facilities are increasingly specified in corrosion resistant grades rather than coated carbon steel.
Fourteen and a Half Metres in a Fourteen Metre World
Three difficulties surfaced during production, and all three came from length rather than from the cross-section. Raw material in the required grade was not available in coils or plates long enough to produce a 14.5 metre bar in one piece, since sourcing beyond 14 metres was not possible. Even setting that aside, welding a single bar of that length would have taken up an unworkable amount of space in the production hall, because a laser welding line needs clear run-out on both sides of the machine and that footprint has to coexist with everything else in production. Finally the finished beam could not travel on a standard truck and required special transportation to reach the site. The section itself is a wide flange geometry with a height of 360 mm, a flange width of 300 mm, a 10 mm web and 16 mm flanges, held within tolerances of 1.5 mm on the overall dimensions and 1 degree on the web to flange angle.
Application Context
Given the sourcing constraint, the beam was produced in two parts, one of 9 metres and one of 5.5 metres, both laser welded, and the two were then butt-welded together to obtain the 14.5 metre bar the design required. Splitting the work this way kept each stage inside the capability of the line while placing a single transverse joint in the finished girder rather than compromising the length. The material is 304L stainless steel, which provides the corrosion resistance and meets the standards expected in pharmaceutical facilities, and Montanstahl arranged the special transport and delivered the beams as the customer requested. Sections of this type belong to the range of HEA, HEB and HEM wide flange beams, produced by laser welding up to 1,000 mm in height and in lengths up to 15 metres, with the differences between the beam families explained in our article on stainless steel beams and their industrial usage and further length options in custom lengths. Technical questions are answered in the technical Q&A.