MHI-Duro Felguera Receives Order for World Biggest TBM - es/104FCC and ACS Dragados have placed a EUR40 million order with MHI-Duro Felguera for the supply of possibly the world's biggest EPB shield, which will be used for the rebuilding of the M-30 orbital motorway in Madrid, on a contract jointly awarded to the two companies. The TBM will be built in Duro Felguera's plant in Asturias, which previously assembled two 10 m-diameter TBMs for the ongoing 2 x 7 km Abdalajis tunnels on the Cordoba-Malaga high speed line. Subscribe to E-News Weekly 32/2003 & 22/2003.The TBM will be used for the excavation of the south bore on the south bypass designed to link up Paseo de Santa Maria de la Cabeza and the A-3, passing under Vallecas bridge. The tunnel has a total length of 4,227 m, the first 100 m of which will be the start box, 3,620 m will be the TBM-driven section (between km point 0.100 and 3.720) and the remainder (from km point 3.720 to the end) corresponding to a cut-and-cover stretch and the exit ramp. The excavated diameter is 15.01 m and the lined inner diameter is 13.45 m. The tunnel will carry three 3.5 m lanes, two 0.5 m shoulders and two 0.7 m pavements.The job also requires to sink the 100 m-long x 60 m-wide x 35 m-deep start box, shared with the north tunnel awarded to Necso and Ferrovial, and two slurry wall exit shafts.The shield cutterhead features a diameter of 15 m, the equivalent of a six-storey building. The machine will weigh 4,000 tonnes for a length of 160 m. The huge machinery is designed to work at a 30 m depth and to progress 0.665 m per minute. It will be equipped with a segment erector to install, as the TBM advances, the concrete rings shaping the internal lining. A screw conveyor behind the face and a belt conveyor will muck out the spoil. Other machines needed at the work site include hydrofraises, piling machines, excavators, etc.The geology consists of soils of Madrid's Tertiary period, better known as intermediate facies (stiff, fissured grey or green marly clays known locally as peñuelas) and evaporitic facies (gypsum).Duro Felguera and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) signed on 8th April, 2003 an agreement to set up MHI-Duro Felguera, S. A., a jointly owned company to build and market TBMs. The goal of the new company is to be a platform to develop business in Europe and Latin America. Subscribe to E-News Weekly 47/2002. Click es/104. Visit www.gdfsa.com and www.urbanismo.munimadrid.es 40/04.