Tunnel Buenavista

Connecting the city of Villavicencio, Colombia to the capital city of Bogota, the Tunel Buenavista (East Tunnel) is a key component in the Autopista al Llano highway and plays a vital role in the nation’s transport network. Stretching more than 4.5km underground, the tunnel is one of the most complex infrastructure challenges in Colombia.

To meet ever increasing traffic capacities and road safety requirements, and in an effort to decrease travel times for commuters, Colombia’s national infrastructure agency ANI is expanding the tunnel with a second, 4.6km tunnel that will run parallel to the original. Supporting the immense excavation effort required, a 250-300 HP 460 Vac motor powers the main fan ventilating the tunnel.

To control the fan, an AuCom EMX4i 352B was the starter of choice. Macing SAS, authorised AuCom distributor in Colombia, supplied and successfully commissioned the EMX4i as quickly as possible to meet the urgent need of the project. Thanks to Macing SAS, the ventilation system was up and running on schedule, preventing any delays in the construction of the tunnel.

Martin Perez Uribe, Technical Manager at Macing SAS, commissioned the starter on site. “The EMX4i is a great starter”, he says. “It’s compact and easy to install, commission and maintain. It’s made my customer happy and made my job easier. I challenge anyone to find another starter that can get an application like this up and running in less than 8 simple programming steps. Only AuCom soft starters are that easy to use.”

Impressed with the performance of the EMX4i and the support he’s received from AuCom, Martin is now working with the project engineers to supply EMX4 starters for the ventilation system in the completed tunnel.

Featured image by Alejandro Blandón / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 3.0