How do you guys fare with material wastage? Obviously in some trades it is less than others, but in ours, each ton of tarmac is bloody expensive (not just the material, but the haulage & handling costs too) and wastage has to be kept to an absolute minimum. Given that our material has to be ordered in advance - sometimes it is a bit of an educated guess as to what we'll need - we can't just magic some up at the end of the job when we're getting short as you could with concrete etc etc.
Obviously you HAVE to have enough material to complete the job, but not too much to have a large amount left over as any waste will come right off your profit at the end of the day.
We are thinking of having a "hot box" in our yard, so that any surplus material from the day before can be used as perhaps a basecourse or regulating material for the next day. Not sure if the running costs etc would make the the 'box viable.
We had a good day yesterday - laid a 620t road (circa 3000m2), started at 8am and finished at 3.30pm - and had the grand total of 2t of material left over! Result....
And to finish it all off, no waiting time on any of the 35 wagons that came to us!
RW Gale Ltd - Civils & Surfacing Contractors based in Somerset
thats good going that dave its less than half a percent wastage, with us any left overs go back to the yard stone, flags, bricks, drianage pipe etc and used another day.
concrete being the exception which generally if we have to much gets used as road base etc in a soft spot of the site or mucked away.
Giles
Groundworks and Equestrian specialists, prestige new builds and sports pitches. High Peak, Cheshire, South Yorkshire area.
It did help having the tar plant less than five miles away, but the shoutback for the last load when you've still got 60t waiting for you to lay is a bit daunting.
Concrete overs? Not that we have much but we tip it onto our broken concrete [to be crushed] stockpile
RW Gale Ltd - Civils & Surfacing Contractors based in Somerset
As GB says thats not a bad percentage Dave on a job that size, what hurts us in when we need a couple of barrows of hot stuff and the minimum drop at the quarry is a tonne.
We try to stack the little jobs up but there are times when you need to invoice so you buy a tonne and skip 60%, and pay silly money to have it taken away.
We have had lads filling pot holes on unadopted lanes and tracks before now just to use it up and not bring it back
henpecked wrote:Ever thought of knocking a few doors and asking the old dears 'Do you need your drive doing? We've just finished this job....'
Apparently, diddycoys have been doing it for years
HP
God no, that's a trait of the small guy down t'road who likes doing driveway overlays nice and thin........even on top of broken concrete, no problem ma'am!
RW Gale Ltd - Civils & Surfacing Contractors based in Somerset
flowjoe wrote:As GB says thats not a bad percentage Dave on a job that size, what hurts us in when we need a couple of barrows of hot stuff and the minimum drop at the quarry is a tonne.
We try to stack the little jobs up but there are times when you need to invoice so you buy a tonne and skip 60%, and pay silly money to have it taken away.
That's the trouble - and I bet you're paying £100/ton for the convenience of having it dropped onto the back of your wagon.
You guys when you need a small amount would be better approaching a local blacktop contractor and asking if they have any left spare at the end of the day to come round and do the job - but that's only any good if it suits you invoicing-wise and of course, money-wise plus the logistics of the job.
We had a classic case last week - a bob-the-can-do-it-all builder with an estate car and trailer had put a new water supply into a house and wanted some advice on reinstating the tarmac - he was asking about was a whacker plate good enough etc - by the time he'd bought a ton of 6mm and faffed about doing the job, he'd have been better off asking us to do the reinstatement, as we'll be doing a 10t job just round the corner from him next week. But he didn't even ask!
Little jobs we call our "Milk Round" - pain in the arse jobs, having to load/unload plant countless times......
RW Gale Ltd - Civils & Surfacing Contractors based in Somerset
Dave_L wrote:by the time he'd bought a ton of 6mm and faffed about doing the job, he'd have been better off asking us to do the reinstatement, as we'll be doing a 10t job just round the corner from him next week. But he didn't even ask!
Little jobs we call our "Milk Round" - pain in the arse jobs, having to load/unload plant countless times......
Busy fool springs to mind. Its better to get a qualified contractor in as even if you save 25-40% its still going to bite you on the arse when the frost lifts it
for small jobs we get the utilities reinstatement lads to do it for pound notes haha, they turn up with hot box wagon, 2 transit tippers with rollers and do a good job.
Giles
Groundworks and Equestrian specialists, prestige new builds and sports pitches. High Peak, Cheshire, South Yorkshire area.
