Augusta ? Senior engineers from the Maine Department of Transportation will be hosting officials from Japan?s Tokyo Rope Manufacturing on Wednesday Dec. 7th and Thursday Dec. 8th to discuss the latest innovations in wire, wire rope, steel cord, fiber rope and carbon fiber composite strands. The delegation and MaineDOT Chief Engineer Ken Sweeney will be traveling to the University of Maine?s Advanced Structures and Composite Center (AEWC) in Orono to collaborate and share ideas surrounding carbon fiber composite strands and its proven benefit to industry.
In addition, the engineers will be touring Harbor Technologies in Brunswick, which produced the composite beams (with a combination of concrete, steel and fiberglass) used to replace the Knickerbocker Bridge in Boothbay, making it the largest composite bridge in the United States.
Thursday, Dec. 8th the Tokyo Rope Manufacturing engineers will arrive at MaineDOT Headquarters in Augusta to meet with the Engineering Council to discuss the structural and economic benefits of using CFCC strands in projects such as bridges, guard rails and reinforced concrete. ?This is a unique opportunity for Maine to hear what Japanese engineers are working on in the structural composites field,? says MaineDOT Chief Engineer Ken Sweeney, ?as well as share with them what Maine has for ideas regarding the infrastructure needs of today.?
Attendees from Tokyo Rope Manufacturing will be engineers Tsuyoshi Enomoto, Ken-ichi Ushijima, Noriyoshi Inoue, Masamichi Sugahara and Yoshiaki Yamamoto.