**7.3 Crane mats**

On building sites crane mats are used to obtain a stable work area on which heavy cranes and other machinery can operate. Generally crane mats are composed

**Figure 13.** *Crane mats in use at a building site [3].*

of beams of tropical hard wood. The choice for this material is based on the requirements on strength, wear resistance and durability. The crane mats depicted in **Figure 13** have outer dimensions of 1 x 5 m and are composed of five azobé beams with dimensions 200 x 200 x 5000 mm that are assembled using five steel bars.

In cooperation with Welex (manufacturer of crane mats, based in The Netherlands), a crane mat was made from EoL thermoset composite beams. RTMinfusion was used for the production of the beams. In the mould first a glass injection mat (900 g/m<sup>2</sup> ), 2 layers of quadraxial glass reinforcement (1200 g/m<sup>2</sup> ) and 10 layers of UD glass reinforcement (840 g/m<sup>2</sup> ) were applied after which the core was built up from flakes of EoL composite in combination with fire-dried sand (1–2 mm grain). The five holes of 30 mm diameter for the assembly of the crane mat were created in the beams using tubular inserts. The crane mat was tested under various severe operating conditions. After the filling of the core with resin, the reinforcement layers from the bottom were folded over the top before closing the mould and starting the injection process. The EoL composite crane mat performed very well, showing good resistance to wear by vehicles and was easy to clean, see **Figure 14**.

**Figure 14.** *Crane mat made of EoL composite tested in practice [3].*

**Figure 15.** *Dinzer bridge with deck profiles of re-used composite: Installation and final result [15].*
