When the first snow falls in the Swiss Upper Engadine in November, work will begin on the world's last existing natural ice bobsleigh run at the St. Moritz-Celerina Olympic Bob Run. Within three weeks, the South Tyrolean track team will build the world's largest snow sculpture from 15,000 cubic meters of snow and 7,000 cubic meters of water. In addition to the professional operation of the bobsleigh run, such as hosting World and European Championships as well as training runs, the Olympic Bob Run also offers guest bobsleighing. The 4-seater bobsleighs are therefore available daily for a ride down the 1,722-metre-long natural ice bobsleigh run from St. Moritz at a starting height of 1,852 meters to Celerina, 130 meters lower down.

New warehouse for 75 bobsleds

Until the winter before last, the bobsleighs from the Olympic Bob Run were stored in five different buildings. From there, around 20 bobsleds a day were brought to the start area by four employees each. With the aim of making the storage and handling of the sledges more efficient, the management decided to build a new bobsleigh garage in St. Moritz. In summer 2016, a 60-metre-long and 15-metre-wide underground garage was built in the mountain, in which each bobsleigh has a fixed storage space. A total of 75 sledges are stored in the warehouse on two levels in a specially built shelving system.

The organizers decided to use an industrial truck to relieve the burden on the Olympic Bob Run employees during transport. "Our most important requirement was to transport the bobs safely and without damage in the limited space available in the warehouse. Thanks to their expertise in the field of special solutions, we therefore chose Hubtex and Rohrer-Marti," reports Damian Gianola, Managing Director of the Olympia Bob Run. The manufacturer of custom-built industrial trucks and its Swiss partner were involved in the project from the planning stage of the new building and also advised the managing director on the racking system. Following completion of the underground car park, the compact MQ 30 electric multidirectional sideloader with loading platform was delivered to Switzerland in December 2016.

Gripping device for different carriages

"One of the challenges we faced when developing the vehicle was to take into account the individual dimensions of the loads picked up and to develop a load pick-up that can pull the bobs independently," explains Elmar Krenzer, project manager at Hubtex. While industrial companies usually use multidirectional sideloaders to transport long and bulky loads, the Olympia Bob Run transports 2- and 4-person bobs with different dimensions and equipment.