Tag Archives: Export

Southampton Container Port Visit

container-port-visitEmployees of REIDsteel recently visited Southampton docks for a tour of the container terminal hosted by DP World, who run the container port operations with its partner Associated British Ports (ABP) – They saw the continuing development of facilities at Southampton, including the new recently completed No 5 Berth, which can take the very largest container vessels in service anywhere in the world.

Between 70% and 80% of REIDsteel structures are exported through ports in the UK, such as Southampton.

The visitors from REIDsteel are all involved in the export of REIDsteel structures: despatch and shipping manager Ana Monti and despatch administrator Catherine Carey, who make the arrangements for export shipments and prepare export documentation; Ali Titcombe and Tim Cook from the commercial team; yard foreman Ian Hibbard, crane drivers Steve Marshall and Steve Frampton, who lead the loading of materials into the shipping containers at our factory in Christchurch; Luke Armes who travels to supervise off site loading activities.

REIDsteel’s shipping agents, Meachers Global Logistics were represented by Rob Lewis, Director for Freight Forwarding.

The group received a briefing on the activities of the port by DP World Southampton’s Commercial Manager Robert Freeman and met the operations manager, who explained the ship planning process; also how the arrival and departure of container ships is managed along with other port movements, such as the large numbers of cruise ships that now use the port of Southampton and the oil vessels berthing at Fawley refinery.

The group were then taken on a tour of the container port and shown the whole process from arrival of containers at the port by either road or rail: how the vehicle booking system (VBS) works; the auto-check-in; the security checks that take place; customs checks; how the trucks are directed to the correct area to off load; how the containers are handled by enormous straddle carriers and place in stacks, then picked and loaded by enormous cranes onto the ship.

The group were driven in a minibus down all five berths to see the ship loading/off loading activities close up. And the whole process is running in reverse too for handling incoming containers with goods being imported to the UK.

The enormity of the operation at Southampton has to be seen to be believed – On the day we visited there were over 34,000 TEUs (Twenty foot Equivalent Units) in the ‘stack’ at the port.

“How do they find the correct container and put it on the correct ship you might ask?” These days it is all done by GPS – The location of each container in the stack is recorded automatically by GPS as it is placed by the straddle carrier.

The company welcome the continued development at DP World Southampton in the hope that in the future more of the routes we need for export of our goods will be available from a local port, significantly reducing the number of road miles our goods have to travel when compared to shipment from other UK ports, such as Felixstowe, Tilbury and northern ports.

A Visit from Nigeria

nigeriavisit-newsREIDsteel were pleased to host a tour of our five acre site for the Director of Bridge Design of the Federal Ministry of Works, Mr. Aniete O. Effiony.

He was accompanied by our the Managing Director, Mr. Charles Orie of our Nigerian partners, Johnsons Construction Co. We welcomed the group with Mr. Graham Crouch, consultant at Crouch Waterfall and Partners.

For yet another wonderful talk about the unique steel design engineering we complete at REIDsteel, we thank our staff; Tim Cook, Commercial Manager; John Harrison, Structural Engineer; Roger Bennett, Design Engineer and Andy Davies, Production Manager.

Springside Industrial Units, Trinity, Jersey

springside-news01REIDsteel have a history of working in the Channel Islands and were delighted to be given the opportunity to design, fabricate and erect 2 new Industrial buildings in Trinity, Jersey.

We had been involved in the planning and pricing of the project for over 5 years before we were chosen to complete the building envelope and worked with the main contractor, F Nicolson and Sons, architects, J Design and consulting engineers, Ross Gower associates.

REIDsteel were also chosen to construct the 2 structures due to the client owning the original units adjacent to the site supplied by REIDsteel in 2000 and being impressed by the lack of repairs and maintenance needed due to the quality of the building provided.

Working with the client’s team enabled us to design the steel structure to allow a specific floor area and clear height as well as detail in the architectural features of the buildings, near 3m overhangs at the eaves with cantilever tubular struts and floor to roof, brick piers which were to be tied back into the structure.

The interface between cladding and steelwork was detailed and ordered in house from leading UK suppliers to offer a 25 year guarantee of both composite roof panels and double skin wall cladding.

Detailing the cladding in house also give Reidsteel a great advantage to design and supply the glazing and personnel doors. REIDglazing provided powder coated aluminium windows and steel doors with glazed port holes.

All materials were scheduled and shipped logically from our site in Christchurch ensuring our experienced erection team were never held up waiting for materials and could complete both buildings in fewer than 18 weeks much to the satisfaction of the client and the end users who were ready to move in.

In addition to steelwork, cladding, gutters and glazing we were also responsible for applying the intumescent paint to the steel work and providing a fall restraint running line system. Something that allows the end users to access the roof via a lanyard and carry out roof maintainance.

REIDsteel and Zulal

zulal-news01REIDsteel are proud to have recently supplied three Water treatment plants to Libyan Contractor Zulal Water Technology.

We supplied the steel frames, composite cladding, glazing, doors, roof extraction vents and a 5-tonne overhead crane to each building.

The installation of all REIDsteel supplied components were assisted by experienced supervisor Rowland Phillips.

The Gialo plant was completed in only nine months, on a full turnkey basis. The plant is producing excellent quality of water and should provide the people at Gialo field with a reliable supply for many years to come.

Slow boat to China

Shipping a small parcel abroad is enough to cause me to have a headache so sending massive steel structures, like aircraft hangars and bridges from a small town in Dorset to 130 countries worldwide must surely be enough to cause the mother of all migraines.

To find out just how difficult a job this is I had a chat with Ana Monti, REIDsteel’s Despatch and Shipping Manager.

In the five years that Ana’s been with the company she has shipped hundreds of hangars, bridges, office buildings and warehouses to places as far flung as Mongolia, Nepal and the Falkland Islands.

Ana maintains (although I’m not sure I believe her) that it’s not particularly difficult to organise the shipping, as long as you don’t mind filling in reams of paperwork, but there can be unexpected pitfalls.

Two of the main problems in recent years have been the slow-down in the economy and the fluctuating cost of fuel. The economic situation has meant quite a few shipping companies have gone out of business.

Of those that remain, rather than put the price up to customers some control their fuel costs by getting the ships to go at half their normal speed.

While it’s good that costs don’t skyrocket, it’s far from ideal to discover that a shipment that was due to arrive in, let’s say, July actually arrives in September.

Thankfully, because Reid’s has been shipping its products around the world for almost a century, they are well used to making contingencies and Ana says it’s rare that this ‘go slow’ causes major problems for customers.

Aside from being supremely organised and having an excellent eye for detail, I ask Ana what other skills she thinks are necessary to do her job. Surprisingly her answer is “a good knowledge of the world’s religious calendar.”

Festivals, such as Eid for example, mean some ports close down completely, so knowing what’s coming up when planning a shipment is essential to her delivery scheduling.

Now that’s not something you’d see on everyone’s CV.

 

Britain’s Steel Experts Build Bridges for Nepal’s Financial Growth

Sabha Kholanews01Slow growth in Nepal’s exports and difficulty moving home-grown agricultural products around the country to reduce dependence on imports are getting a boost from steel bridges that are designed and built in the UK.

Helped by £3 million of funding from the British government, through the Department for International Development’s (DFID) Rural Access Programme (RAP), REIDsteel of Christchurch, Dorset was appointed by local contractor Kalika of Khatmandu to construct a 120m steel span bridge to open up access between Khandbari and Chainpur and boost trade across the Sabha Khola river.

Sabha Kholanews02The bridge links Sankhuwasabha with the national road network and has the potential to transform the lives of 800,000 people – The river runs through the Arun Valley, one of the deepest in the world at 300-435 metres.

Without a bridge the people of the region faced extreme difficulties crossing from one side to the other. During the monsoon season boats would regularly capsize, putting lives and cargo in peril.

Building a bridge in such a remote region is easier said than done. Road access was little more than mud tracks in places and the mountainous terrain meant getting steel girders from the port to the site was a logistical nightmare.

Sabha Kholanews03However, REIDsteel has almost 100 years’ experience of building bridges around the world and the company completed a similar, slightly smaller 96 metre bridge in the region in 2011.

This meant the team was able to design, manufacture, ship and construct the bridge within just one year, far quicker than the contractor had expected.
Rollo Reid, REIDsteel’s technical director says:

The speed of construction was down to the hard work and dedication of the team of local workers. Supervisors sent by us from the UK trained the team and oversaw the work but the hard manual work was done by the Nepalise builders working on the project.

Hard manual labour is exactly what it takes to build bridges in Nepal. When REIDsteel built the Piluwa Kohla bridge, north of Dharan in Nepal, no cranes were available so towers were made using disused electricity transmission steel poles and two aerial ropeways spanning the river were put in place.

Using ropes and hand-power, the sections of the bridge were put into position. Although this work was done during the dry season, the project suffered a set-back when a flood surged down the river, sweeping several of the girders and pole props into the water.

Luckily, once the flood water had abated, the bridge parts could be salvaged and work was able to resume.

Rollo Reid continues:

Sabha Kholanews04The satisfaction of getting through the build stages and seeing the finished bridges is immense.

The structures provide the only bit of straight, flat road for miles around and it’s incredibly rewarding to see the sheer joy on the faces of locals who no longer have to dice with death to cross the valley.

Knowing that something that was designed, crafted and shipped from a small town in England will have a major impact on helping trade flourish in such a remote part of the world makes all of us at Reid’s extremely proud.

Aircraft Hangar for Eznis Airways, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia

Eznis-news01In early 2011 we were successful in being awarded a contract to design and supply an Aircraft Hangar for Eznis Airways.

This hangar was required to house their fleet comprising of four Saab 340B aircraft and two Avro RJ85 aircraft, which serve their expanding domestic flights service operating from the Chinggis Khaan International Airport in Ulaanbaatar.

The project required the design and fabrication of a 50m clear span Hangar together with a two storey office, workshop and stores facility on either side of the Hangar and across the rear elevation.

Eznis-news02In addition, we supplied the Eznis Company Logo which sits proudly on both gable peaks of the Hangar and we also produced a separate pair of sliding doors which can be opened to allow the nose of an Avro RJ85 aircraft to be worked on in inside the Hangar whilst the rest of the aircraft remains outside.

A set of inflatable fabric seals mounted on the main Hangar doors and matched to the shape of the fuselage ensure that the weather stays outside.

Eznis-news03We designed, fabricated and shipped every piece of steelwork, together with the cladding and the very important insulation material.

(temperatures in Ulaanbaatar hit + 40°C in the summer, but drop to – 40°C in the winter)

All packaged into more than 20 containers from the UK to Ulaanbaatar and also supervised the construction and erection of the structure before the worst of the winter weather set in.

Felicite Island Residences

Felicite-newsREIDsteel were first approached by the Félicité Island Development Company in July 2009 to carry out the design, fabrication and shipping of the structural steel framing for the roof and fascias of the first of a series of designer homes.

Nestling on a small segment of unspoilt Félicité, one of the inner Seychelles islands, the development will consist of 28 Bond-style residences, each with panoramic views of the Indian Ocean, swimming pool ceilings and private helipad.

Renowned architect Richard Hywel Evans describes his vision for Zil Payson as ‘a whole new resort standard in terms of vision, design, experience and sustainability, crafted from indigenous materials that melt into a landscape of staggering beauty’.

The villas are now nearing completion, and are for sale on a 99-year lease starting from a snip at £1.9 million.

Project: Felicite Island Residences
Client: Félicité Island Development Company
Location: Zil Payson Resort, Seychelles