January saw the launch of what is currently the world’s largest cruise ship. The Icon Of The Seas from U.S. shipping company Royal Caribbean has every superlative you could imagine. It offers holidaymakers the largest water park on the seas, with a choice of seven pools and the opportunity to take a dip in the biggest ever swimming pool on board a cruise ship. To ensure the nearly 8,000 passengers don’t miss out on digital offerings on their tablets, smartphones, etc. while they make use of all the ship’s attractions, two data centres and around 40 IT distribution bases have been installed on board. These facilities are home to numerous IT racks and water-based server cooling systems (LCP) from Rittal. “Reliable IT that works perfectly is incredibly important, especially for the passengers and their travel experience. After all, everything runs on this infrastructure – from Wi-Fi to the booking systems, which must operate without any glitches at all times,” says Karsten Wehlauer, Key Account Manager Maritime at Rittal.

Meyer Turku in Finland took care of the project management and construction work for this giant cruise ship. The company’s global collaboration with Rittal and experience from successful IT projects in Germany proved beneficial. “This is currently the biggest project Rittal has on the water,” emphasises Wehlauer, who helped his Rittal colleagues in Finland set up the IT infrastructure on board the Icon Of The Seas.

At Düsseldorf Airport, up to 50 fixed emergency standby systems ensure the power is back on again in just a few seconds in the event of an outage. The installation of outdoor enclosures with Rittal technology for connecting mobile emergency generators ensures these systems operate reliably, even during maintenance work. “Previously, we often had to drag power cables over long distances to reach the low-voltage main distribution board,” explains Benedikt Sauer, who is responsible for the high-voltage technology at Düsseldorf Airport. Henkelhausen was the company commissioned to develop the concept, design and configuration of the new enclosures from the Rittal CS TopTec series. The enclosures were installed at the key runway stations and are “ready for take-off” whatever the weather.

The Institut Cartogràfic i Geològic de Catalunya (ICGC) specialises in cartography, geodesy, geophysics and geology. It commissioned the strategic Rittal partner Abast to build a new data centre for the secure processing and storage of sensitive data. The biggest challenge was that the new data centre had to be built next to the old one, in a confined space in a listed building, and with the IT infrastructure still running. The key criteria included security, availability and energy efficiency. The new data centre was completed in just six months. A Rittal Basic Protection room accommodating 22 IT racks ensures maximum physical security. These racks were arranged in a cold aisle. The data centre climate is controlled by 12 Rittal LCP DX precision climate control units, while Rittal RiZone takes care of monitoring.

Rittal has completed not one but two major IT projects in China. The Yueke Data Centre in Ezhou City, which is run by the Yueke Data Company, uses Rittal solutions such as IT racks. Hot aisle containment ensures the high energy efficiency of these racks. A further project that Rittal China carried out with the distributor Tingfeng is a data centre project for a Chinese automotive company. Before deciding to fit out their data centre with Rittal IT racks, the people in charge were able to study a demo rack and were suitably impressed by the quality of the Rittal solutions.

Pichlerwerke in Austria uses Eplan as well as punching and bending machines from Rittal Automation Systems to manufacture copper busbars for enclosures in a semi-automated process. The partners have developed a common data interface for a seamless connection between software and machine.

The electrical engineering company has been using Eplan software in its electrical design engineering for a number of years now. The Eplan Pro Panel Copper add-on also makes it possible to depict bent copper parts in 3D. What’s more, Pichlerwerke uses machines from Rittal Automation Systems to machine the copper busbars. The Eplan data serves as a basis for tasks such as defining the correct dimensions of the punched holes and bends.

Eplan and Rittal Automation Systems have now jointly developed an interface for seamless data transfer between the design engineering software and production machinery. Copper busbars that used to be machined manually can now be produced in a semi-automated operation, which streamlines the production process and boosts efficiency.

During the retrofit of its substation 2, KCM 2000 Holding JSC, a group of Bulgarian companies in the mining and metal sector, had to modernise its entire low-voltage main distribution board (LVDB). Eight air-cooled compressors with a total installed output of 2 megawatts were to replace five water-cooled piston compressors with a total installed output of 3 megawatts. Eltera M, the system integrator commissioned to carry out the work, used the Rittal VX Ri4Power solution for the LVDB.

One particular challenge was that the cabling had to be identical so that the solution could be connected using the existing lines. Furthermore, it was necessary to achieve higher rated currents in a smaller space. The VX Ri4Power system ensures this thanks to an optimised arrangement of the main busbar. This system is also certified to IEC 61439-1 for the manufacture of safe low-voltage switchgear.