Following seven years of preparation, the XXIXth Olympic Summer Games were officially opened at exactly 8.08 p.m. on August
8, 2008 at the Beijing National Stadium. China’s long-held dream of holding the Olympic Games on its own territory had finally
come true. The whole of the world’s attention was focused on China.
High-tech equipment was deployed on a large scale at the opening and closing ceremonies of the Beijing Summer Olympics in
2008. Despite numerous strong competitors, SEW-EURODRIVE (Tianjin) Co., Ltd. was selected to be the exclusive supplier for
all drive engineering requirements for the opening and closing ceremonies.
On conclusion of the contract, SEW-EURODRIVE (China) immediately formed a technical “Olympics team” of top specialists and
experts, designed to ensure professional drive engineering support for successful staging of the opening ceremony.
The opening ceremony began at 8.08 p.m. with an impressive firework display. The national stadium, fitted with 91,000 seats,
was full of excited spectators who followed the amazing events on the stage. Behind all the magical scene changes, SEW drive
engineering staged its own successful show. For example, the cable winches that raised the Olympic rings consisted of twenty-six
type KAF77 helical-bevel gearmotors and several MOVIDRIVE® B frequency inverters. The opening and closing mechanism of the
main stage in the form of a traditional Chinese scroll was driven by four R137 gearmotors.
Various SEW-EURODRIVE systems and units were also mounted on the roof of the stadium. A variety of 214 horizontally and vertically
aligned drives and motors and 211 frequency inverters were used for lifting equipment, lighting the stage, and moving cameras,
stuntmen and women. The drive systems were subjected to exacting technical requirements in terms of control accuracy and the
stability and reliability of system operation.
A total of 560 SEW gear units and 450 SEW frequency inverters were used. Operation of the SEW products was smooth and trouble-free,
thus ensuring the tremendous success of the opening and closing ceremonies at the Olympic Summer Games 2008 in Beijing.
For more information contact: kewei.zhu@sew-eurodrive.cn
