The truck transporting the crane arrives early on Wednesday, September 2. Grey clouds over Adlershof, but that doesn't stop the team from setting up the crane.
A new cooling tower flying to BESSY's roof
The crane is installed directly in front of the truck sluice of the storage ring hall.
The puzzle begins, the swivel arm (blue) is over 90m long.
The crane weighs 96 tons, plus additional 90 tons counterweight (see picture). The cooling tower itself weighs 2 tons.
Now all is ready and waiting for the mission to start on Thursday 3rd September.
Warming up : the frame on which the cooling tower will later stand is lifted onto the roof. It is Thursday before nine o'clock, the sky is blue, the sun is shining!
Even from the Ruska Ufer it can not be overlooked: there is something happening at BESSY II. Such a voluminous crane is used at HZB for the first time.
After a few final touches, the time has come: around 9:30 am the cooling tower is lifted into the air.
For the admirative observers it goes almost too fast. The cooling tower flies...
...and floats towards the BESSY II courtyard, over the green roof.
Straight as a die it goes towards the installation lot.
The installation team is already waiting there, now the precision work continues. Around 10:15 a.m. the cooling tower is in its designated place.
Let me introduce you to BESSY's fourth cooling tower!
Here a little sneak peak into the inside of the cooling tower.
Soon after the "exciting part" is over and the team starts dismantling again the crane. The parts are carefully disassembled and wait next to BESSY II for their next mission.
Early September a huge crane near BESSY II could be seen from afar. A series of pictures for you to discover the exciting installation of the fourth cooling tower.
"We have been planning this for more than a year," explains Christian Jung, who is coordinating the work with Ingo Müller during the shutdown of the electron storage ring BESSY II.
Both watch with great interest as the twelve specialists assemble the crane, attach the cooling tower, then swing it over the roof and finally install it. Both are certain that the transport of the fourth cooling tower works only with detailed planning and a great deal of precision. "We have never needed such a large crane before," says Ingo Müller. Some HZB colleagues come by, pull out cell phones and capture these moments: you don't see something like that every day.
The installation of the fourth cooling tower, which is now safely located in the courtyard in the middle of the ring building, is one of the biggest jobs during the shutdown.
Read more about the shutdown period: The shutdown at BESSY II: busy activity in the ring
Pictures: Christian Feiler, Ingo Müller and Florentine Krawatzek.
- MXene for energy storage: More versatile than expectedMXene materials are promising candidates for a new energy storage technology. However, the processes by which the charge storage takes place were not yet fully understood. A team at HZB has examined, for the first time, individual MXene flakes to explore these processes in detail. Using the in situ Scanning transmission X-ray microscope 'MYSTIIC' at BESSY II, the scientists mapped the chemical states of Titanium atoms on the MXene flake surfaces. The results revealed two distinct redox reactions, depending on the electrolyte. This lays the groundwork for understanding charge transfer processes at the nanoscale and provides a basis for future research aimed at optimising pseudocapacitive energy storage devices.
- AI re-examines dinosaur footprintsFor decades, paleontologists have pondered over mysterious three-toed dinosaur footprints. Were they left by fierce carnivores, gentle plant-eaters, or even early birds? Now, an international team has used artificial intelligence to tackle the problem—creating a free app that readily lets anyone decipher the past.
- Ernst Eckhard Koch Prize and Innovation Award on Synchrotron Radiation 2025At the 27th BESSY@HZB User Meeting, the Friends of HZB honoured the dissertation of Dr Enggar Pramanto Wibowo (Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg). The Innovation Award on Synchrotron Radiation 2025 went to Prof. Tim Salditt (Georg-August-University Göttingen) and Professors Danny D. Jonigk and Maximilian Ackermann (both, University Hospital of RWTH Aachen University).