Merry Christmas

Well our Christmas cards have all gone out and we're just about ready to head off on our short winter break and begin the promised festivities! Have a wonderful Christmas and we'll see you in the new year!

My Lovely Mug

This morning we were the proud recipients of our new promotional coffee mugs! We have been drinking our hot beverages out of some very nice mugs (at the back here) up until now, its just that we though it would be nice to add a little humour and brightness to the experience. And so voilà - here they are!

The idea was two concrete pumps, a mobile pump and a static, pumping concrete round the mug endlessly and obliviously into each other's hoppers. The picture was cleverly executed by the chap who does our Christmas cards (we've been busy sorting those out too...) and the mug people even managed to make the image wrap all the way round going through the handle. Good work!

So now we have our new mugs, if that isn't a good excuse to visit Schwing Stetter for a nice new concrete pump I don't know what is!

Surprise Date

Our 2017 calendars have arrived from Germany and guess who's got the January spot? The opening picture is the one I took up at Merseylink of the three Reilly's pumps at dawn!

I knew they were putting my picture in there somewhere but it's nice to open the calendar and actually see it 'in the flesh' as it were. Nice also to realise that my 'work' will be hanging on thousands of walls around the world, if only for a month!

They have cropped the original a little differently to how I did (see mine below) - basically because theirs needs to fit into a square rather than a rectangle - I've think they've done it just fine though.

Happy January everyone (when it comes...)

New Platform

As we constantly strive for better ways to do things and increase our productivity, it was decided to make use of a whole lot of unused space a few metres above the floor in the back corner a create another mezzanine floor.

Robs design and workmanship once again came to the fore to build everything needed and over the last few weeks the whole thing was build and assembled from scratch. He was even able to tell me how weight each step was able to hold. Such a talented team we have...

The space to fill

Rob assembling the staircase

First part of steel structure in place

Structure taking shape

Flooring down

The view from the new platform

All finished

Old Pictures

When a firm has been going as long as this, you never know what you might find lurking around the place. Yesterday, while sorting something in one corner of the workshop I suddenly noticed three pictures propped up by a pipe again the wall.

My first thought was that they were paintings; the years of grime mixed with the slightly surreal colours of old images combined to remind me for a moment of some of my dad's old paintings in his workshop. A couple of seconds and a slightly closer inspection revealed them instead however to be photos of some of our pumps.

What I found really intriguing was the last one (at the bottom here). It was obviously a very old style pump. Scott (our chief engineer) vaguely recognised it as one of our old Screed pumps from the 1980s - possibly from before Schwing and Stetter had joined forces or Schwing had patented the Rock Valve (both happened in 1982).

Scott also mentioned that one of our long serving old employees, Jack, features in the one in front of Tower Bridge (click of the image to enlarge it).

A few minutes with a damp cloth and some paper towel managed to remove most of the dirt from the pictures and so I was able to get the shots of them here on the right before placing them back where I had found them, albeit a little cleaner and brighter.

Safe Slewing

A few days ago I gave Scott, our chief engineer a lift down to the docks to pick up a new mobile pump - just rolled off the ferry from Germany. However beforehand there was a client nearby who needed a quick problem solved.

They were about to start using an SPB32 separate placing boom to place the concrete on a new development which was quite close to some high voltage power lines. Of course any metal (or earthed object) getting too close to these things is inviting serious trouble so they wanted us to restrict the slewing angle so the boom couldn't get too close to the lines.

We climbed up the tower and Scott set to work and programmed the necessary restrictions and had tested the results in what was probably less than half an hour while I took a few shots from the platform.

It was interesting to see an example of the variety of things our engineers are asked to do. It was also interesting (and quite affirming) to see how quickly and easily a Schwing Separate Placing Boom can be adjusted in this way.

Promotional Film

Over at our German HQ, our opposite numbers have put together a rather good promotional video which they have playing in their reception area. They have been kind enough to forward me the file for this - so here it is for your viewing pleasure...

Animated Ability

The people at our Head Office in Germany have been busy of late. Alwyne, one of our very good sales chaps came back from Bauma with a memory stick for me with some really good animations which the Germans had put together. They show the new S 38 SX 'Reptor' boom opening and reaching into some really tight spots.

One of this blogs most popular posts has been the one showing the S 36 S reaching into the workshop space. These animations show how the new Reptor (as in Reptile - Snake like flexibility...) can reach into a difficult space in a similar manner, and also shows it opening up under a restricted height (7.4 metres since you ask).

I have put them both on a new web page on out website. You can also see them below...