The Catalan company Hercal has acquired the largest demolition excavator in Spain and Portugal, the Liebherr R 980 Demolition. A benchmark in the circular demolition sector, Hercal has always been known for going the extra mile when it comes to innovation and quality. ‘Our goal is to be at the forefront of circular demolition, so it’s essential to have powerful, reliable, state-of-the-art machinery, capable of undertaking complex and sophisticated projects with the highest standards of quality and safety’, says Marcos Calleja, CEO of Hercal.
Based in Terrassa (Barcelona), the company highlights the 60-metre plus reach of its new Liebherr R 980 Demolition, which allows Hercal to meet client demands for safe mechanical demolition projects, especially compared to using manual demolition or even blasting. This addition to the fleet will also allow the company to carry out demolitions at a height of 20 metres using 15-tonne attachments. In short, the main application areas for the R 980 Demolition will be ‘challenging demolitions at great heights (over 40 metres or complex projects ranging between 20 and 30 metres in height) or mechanical demolitions where time and performance are vital for our clients’, says José Calleja, Hercal's general manager.
Hercal has an annual turnover of 90 million euros and, despite its size, the company’s family ethos is one of its defining features. Adding the Liebherr R 980 Demolition to its fleet of machinery is a real milestone: ‘We’re especially excited that its debut will be close to our facilities, so we can fine-tune everything and let the whole Hercal team see it in action’, stresses Marcos Calleja. Indeed, this excavator will debut on a site in the Zona Franca in Barcelona, where the R 980 Demolition is the perfect choice: demolition of a reinforced concrete building made up of 18 circular silos and 2 square silos up to 40 metres high.
The Liebherr R 980 Demolition from Hercal is the first of its kind to be delivered to the Iberian Peninsula. ‘This is an important turning point in our growth plan and in our commitment to sustainable demolition. We want to continue to grow and have the capability to offer an increasingly bespoke response to the demands and needs of our clients’, says José Calleja. ‘We want to take on increasingly complex and sophisticated projects, which is why it was vital not only to have the best team, but also the most sophisticated machinery’, concludes Marcos Calleja.
Hercal has been relying on Liebherr machinery for years. Evidence of this can be seen in their fleet, made up of the R 938 crawler excavator, the LH40 material handler with combined grapple and shearing equipment, the L 580 XPower and L 566 XPower wheel loaders, and the LR 636 crawler loader. They work around 160 hours a month on earthmoving and demolition projects, both on-site and at their own H-ZERO construction and demolition waste recovery plant.
The R 980 Demolition is the largest in its category, a multi-purpose machine with an operating weight of 200 tonnes, telescopic equipment and a reach of 60 metres, designed and developed after months of study, testing and modifications to produce a product that fully meets client expectations. The Liebherr R 980, manufactured by Liebherr-France SAS, is available in four demolition variants with reaches of 21, 26, 36 and 55 metres. The 21-metre and 26-metre models can carry 15 tonnes, while the 36-metre version handles 7 tonnes and the 55-metre version up to 3 tonnes.
