Eleanor Harris: An Eye On British Airways i360

If you have been on the seafront over the past couple of weeks, you will have seen that the i360 construction is now well underway and has already reached over 60 metres high. The main question we get asked at the moment is: how are we going to build the tower? Most people imagine that we’ll be lifting the can, can by can up into the sky, but actually the method is quite different from that.
For the first six cans we were able to lift the cans into place using our giant yellow crane (nick-named T-rex), but all the remaining 11 cans will now be built from the top down using our jacking tower. The jacking tower is the large 60 metre high square tower and is a clever piece of equipment designed specifically by our engineering team from Hollandia for the i360 construction.
The jacking tower is a bit like a vertical factory where a can is rolled into the jacking tower, then all the cans above this new can are jacked up to make space for the new can to be added at the bottom. The new can is bolted into place both inside and outside, and this process is then repeated until the i360 tower is complete.

The last lift will be the heaviest and will be an incredible 980 tonnes! We are using a total of 1,386 bolts to secure all the cans in place with the heaviest bolt weighing around 100kg! If you want to learn more about the tower erection, please check out our website.
I also often get asked how long the i360 is designed to last. We have signed a 125-year lease and the i360 is designed to last forever.
We have some moving parts for the vertical cable car, which will be replaced on a planned maintenance programme. Each January the i360 will shut for around a week for our equivalent of an MOT and annual service to keep it in top condition, and we will be hiring a team of on-site engineers next year who will be responsible for the ongoing maintenance.
www.brightoni360.co.uk
Twitter: @TheBrightoni360 @Eleanor_Harris
Facebook: Brighton-i360, Pinterest: Brightoni360 Pics: Kevin Meredith