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Hydrock puts Doosans to work at Northampton waterside

Digger Blogger | 11:17, Wed January 14 2015

Doosan equipment is at the forefront of a waterside regeneration contract in Northampton.

The University of Northampton is building a new £330m campus on a 55-acre site that previously housed Nunn Mills coal-fired power station and an Avon Cosmetics factory.

Specialist contractor Hydrock bought new earthmoving machinery to carry out the land remediation for the scheme from its Doosan dealer, Kellands.

The first phase of the project, now complete, involved land remediation where the power station stood. Hydrock is now working on the second phase remediation works on the former Avon Cosmetics manufacturing site.  As well as remediation, this phase has included breaking up of the extensive concrete slab areas that formed the base and foundations of the old factory, together with excavation, removal of underground hard structures and turning over of the made ground. 

Hydrock has a new DA30 articulated dump truck (ADT) and DL350-3 wheeled loader working alongside new Doosan DX225LC-3, DX300LC-3 and DX420LC-3 excavators.  Hydrock also has DL300 wheeled loaders that it already owned and a DX300LC excavator working on the Northampton site. 

 

 

Commercial manager Jacqueline Vargo says:  “We began purchasing our own plant in 2009 and we bought our first Doosan product, a DX300LC excavator, in 2010 for a project in Bath and today the majority of our fleet is Doosan equipment supplied by Kellands.  The new DX420LC-3 excavator, DL350-3 wheel loader and DA30 ADT are the latest additions to the fleet of Doosan products we have working on the Northampton contract.”

Senior site manager Graham Bean adds: “All the Doosan equipment is of the highest quality and performing well for us. In particular, the latest generation of Doosan excavators has a strong and robust design, with sturdy undercarriages providing excellent stability for all the types of work we undertake. I have also found that the new Doosan machines are faster than the excavators we have previously worked with.” 

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Wherever possible, materials generated by the second phase works in Northampton are screened and sorted for reuse on site, including the placement of engineered fill to form the development platforms. 

Overall, in preparation for later phases of works, Hydrock will import 30,000m3 of fill material under the CL:AIRE Definition of Waste: Development Industry Code of Practice from a variety of other projects around the local area.  This has brought additional sustainability benefits both to the campus project and neighbouring sites that were otherwise sending the material to landfill.

The university site has also posed ecological challenges for the Hydrock team, as seven rare orchids have required relocation as well as the controlled opening, inspection and then sealing of a void suspected to contain bats.

 

 

 

MPU
MPU

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