ive seen some great pics of this :sureway" outfit in action! ive allso seen pics of their equipment at the yard! there is hundreds of pieces shown ,all lined up!im confused! whats the odds of a dirt mover this big , having so many pieces all lined up. and idle????
Things are tough all over. http://www.constructionequipment.com/article/CA6658377.html
In addition to the rather hard times all over, a lot of photos I've seen (at least in teh case of Burnout's photos) They are all lined up at teh end of the day or in the winter, when I'd imagine they shut down large portions of the fleet till spring. But thats just my guess:beatsme
Who is this Sureway of which you speak? Yes it is Sureway's policy at the end of the day to line everything up in line so that all fuel tanks are in a row for night servicing. When its busy fuel trucks come at night to some jobs and fuel production equipment and a lot of earthworks equipment is greased at night. As for hundreds of pieces of equipment being lined up.... yes there is a stockpile still in the yard. But the pictures of that yard I took were all in the winter and dirt moving is a tough gig at -40 degrees. Also you have to remember this is a company with around 1000 pieces of iron. No one really knows what they have because they have older equipment that pre dates the unit numbering system they have. And this is a company that doesn't get rid of anything. They have 245's that haven't moved in years but they are ready to work if they need to. They have 966B and C wheel loaders that should be ripped apart but they are there ready for action. Also this has been a weird year. Work is slow but Sureway went out and purchased their largest competitor in the water and sewer game in the city, they had to fold in around 250-300pcs of equipment into an already huge fleet. Since times are slow a lot of the very new iron is parked so hours aren't racked up. A lot of the older epuipment and the stuff they acquired this year is working and leaving the nice stuff to wait for better days. But as for Sureway as a company, they are pretty interesting to watch some days. And now that I am with a smaller company they are something to be feared. By them buying out their largest competitor they have our office all messed up with aftershocks.
"sureway'' diggers thank you for the reply ,burnout! ive just never known of an excavator that! big!!!! its cool to know they keep up there older stuff too in case needed. they must have one hell of a mechanical crew!
They keep all the old iron because at some point it is all being used in one place or another. They also own their own aggregate company, a mineral and potash mine, the earthworks and water and sewer divisions as well as stripping for LaFarge, Inland Concrete and Trans Alta Mines. Around here they are basically the evil empire. They haven't been able to take on small jobs in the past because all of the equipment is large. The only main hoe for them is a 385 or the 1250's. All of the excavators smaller than a 385/375 or 1250 are basically side hoes. Now with the purchase of IGL they have a lot of smaller iron. Now they have mainline 345's, 450's, 650's, 600's, 700's and a whack of 330's. Now they have the ability to take on smaller jobs instead of just large road or subdivision projects. I snapped some more pictures of one of their projects today after I got back from the ritchie auction.
Sureway also just got spirit river or spirit creek, I cant remember what its called buts its on that grande prarie highway. They also came close on the grande prarie ring road but Dechant got low bid. I think the highway job was 3 million cubes and the ring road 1 million but I might have those reversed.
Yes they did get that job in peace river. They also have some other work kicking around including hwy 21 here in E-Dot.
Kidco is the "Sureway" of southern Alberta. I heard they are up for sale but it might be a rumor. Maybe sureway will buy them too.
Kidco is definately not the Sureway of southern Alberta. Top Notch was the closest to Sureway. Kidco isn't big enough to compete with the Way.
Top notch is no longer around. they went to auction around the same time as DBC, don beddows construction. the story goes that both of the owners passed away late last year, early this year, ending two large companies. Kidco is rumored to be merging with KLS, another Calgary company and IM told a "sister"company. they will now have a very large fleet of truck/pups, as well as a lot more hoes. KIDCO had a winter storage yard up by the airport this winter, with over 80 peices in it, and there still is about 20 left. If they Do merge, I still dont think they will be as big as Sureway. when I worked at kidco, I was told they had over 400 peices, 90 of them buggies, with KLS in the mix, it could be well over 500.
I have seen the laydown area you were talking about and VantageTES could better inform us of any Kidco KLS rumors. I was told Kidco wasn't that big by a few different people. Sureway is getting out of control. Their fleet was somewhere around 800pcs with 160 of those pieces being buggies. Add in 80-90ADTs, 80-90 dozers and who knows how many hoes they had you have a big company. Now with their acquisition of IGL from LaFarge which was another 250-300pcs you have a giant. The smaller companies like Waiward were safe from Sureway to an extent bexause they didn't touch any small jobs under 5-10 000 000 bucks. Now they have a fleet of small excavators, backhoes, skid steers, loaders, dozers and tandems and end dumps and they are going after the small jobs. I was cruising by the University the other day and saw a Deere 135RTS Excavator sitting there with a breaker. A small highway job in the west end with a few 330's and breakers with a 385 digging. These are jobs they never would have touched in the past and their are knocking down doors. Southern Alberta could be interesting. I know they have been looking at work in S.A. With Top Notch out of the way that leaves a lot of room for a big player to make a move whether it be Kidco, Whissel, KLS, Caliber Systems, Volker Stevin or Sureway.