O’Reilly Concrete has grown over the decades to become one of the largest precast manufacturers in Ireland and the UK and has seven production facilities across Ireland. Its frame buildings and range of prestressed and precast walls, floors and stairs are used for many types of construction including schools, apartment blocks and retail developments.
The company’s Ballyhoe Plant manufactures precast walls for rapid build modular construction and in common with many of its products, these are extremely heavy, oversized and potentially hazardous to lift and transport. Since a Combi-SC has been in operation these processes have become much safer and speedier.
“Due to significant recent growth, especially in the UK market, we have ramped up our production capacity,” said Group Operations Director Paddy Hagan, “and we needed to keep up to schedule when it came to getting finished walls out of the factory, and onto HGVs ready for despatch. We also wanted to ensure the best possible health and safety practices, and the Combi-SC made sense on both of these counts. It also has a further benefit of enabling us to do away with hire cranes we previously needed and is a much more flexible solution.”
Current production stands at around 40 walls per day, the heaviest of which can weigh up to 16t. Their size – up to 9.5m by 3m – makes it a tall order for any piece of equipment to quickly and safely move these loads around the site. Paddy Hagan reckons that operational speed is now up by at least 40% compared to using cranes – and the investment in the Straddle will be offset by the savings on hire costs too.
The 30t capacity Combi-SC offloads the walls from a low frame trailer inside and takes them outside to be loaded onto A-frame trailers. O’Reilly’s personnel find the fully remote control model easy to operate and offers excellent visibility for the operator, particularly round tight corners. It is also much more manoeuvrable than a crane and features such as the full side shifting beam with varied lift points and a telescopic facility give it the versatility to lift various sizes of loads. “When we increased production we knew we needed to streamline our handling procedures, and we have successfully done this thanks to our Straddle Carrier,” said Paddy Hagan.
AISLE-MASTER IS TOP OF THE FOOD CHAIN FOR M.J BAKER FOODSERVICE
The West Country’s leading independent food service supplier, M. J. Baker Foodservice, has recently taken delivery of its second Aisle-Master articulated forklift with a cold store specification to keep pace with its busy schedule of deliveries of ambient, chilled, frozen and confectionery products.
The company supplies 3,500 product lines to outlets, schools and local authorities from Penzance to Gloucestershire from its base in Newton Abbot, where the trucks are on the go for a good 16 hours a day, putting pallets into racking and transferring them between the cold and ambient storage facilities ready for loading.
A major factor for the choice of the Aisle- Masters was reliability as well as their ability to operate in very narrow aisles of 1800mm pallet to pallet. Operations Manager Chris Bowden: “We got an Aisle-Master three years ago after experiencing considerable problems with downtime with another articulated brand which was impacting negatively on our customer service. Our first Aisle-Master proved to be so dependable that it was a natural choice to add a second truck when we augmented our warehouse equipment.”
Both trucks are 2t capacity 20SE models with powerful 930 Ah batteries which allow for lengthy operation in the relatively unforgiving temperature of -25ºC. A high frequency overnight charge keeps the two Aisle-Masters running for the whole of the operational shift to ensure constant availability.
Chris is very happy with the outcome: “We appreciate the efficiency of the Aisle- Masters to keep our fast moving operations running smoothly, especially after the issues with our old truck. The drivers like them and find them easy to operate and the change in temperature from the freezer to the ambient area has no negative effect whatsoever on their performance.”
BUILDING FOR GROWTH
In order to keep up with the growing demand for Combilift’s products, the company has invested £40 million in its new manufacturing facility and global HQ in Monaghan. The 40 hectare site will include a 46,000m² production facility, a dedicated Research and Development building and adjoining administrational offices and will be more than double the size of both of the company’s present manufacturing facilities. This expansion will enable Combilift to proceed with its plan to double its current turnover in the next five years and will also create 200 new jobs for skilled technicians and design engineers. You can check out the video updates on the progress of the new build which are regularly posted on the Combilift website.
COMBILIFT LTD
00 353 47 80500
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