Release no.:8004    Word Document     

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Tough Groundwork Job for CASE Excavators In Southampton

The West Quay area of Southampton has undergone dramatic changes over the past few years. Much of the development has been on the 35-acre site that was the Pirelli cable works, which existed since the 1914 and employed over 4,500 at peak time. The plant closed in 1990.

Plant hire contractor, Earthworks, is currently involved in ground clearance works of the last remaining area. The main contract is NATTA. When completed, the £16.3 million redevelopment will be a new 4-storey IKEA Swedish furniture store with over 31,000 m² of retail space, associated 4,143 m² warehouse, a multi-storey car park to accommodate 900 cars and a new vehicular access route from the busy West Quay road. The entrance atrium will be 68.669 m².

The ground clearance work is extremely demanding as virtually the whole area is an extremely thick and heavily reinforced concrete slab which can be anything up to 1 m thick. Working on the toughest section is a CASE CX350 excavator with a Furukawa F35LN breaker. Although the machine has 7,500 hours on the clock, the operator says it is proving ideal for the work. Peter O'Neil, Managing Director of Earthworks, says, “The CX350 has been an excellent machine. It has worked in some very tough jobs and has been extremely reliable.”

The 36 t. CASE CX350 has a power rating of 202 kW and a dipper breakout force of 195 kN. With a maximum dig depth of 6.73 m and forward reach of 10.47 m, it is both versatile and practical to use on inner city development works.

Earthworks also have a large CASE 460 excavator also fitted with a Furukawa hammer. The machines came on site at the beginning of the year and will be through by middle of March.

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