Leading natural and artificial sports ground contractors, White Horse Contractors, has continued its policy of heavily investing in specialised plant and machinery with the purchase of a GKB Drainmaster and 2.2m heavy duty disc seeder from sportsturf equipment specialists BLEC (Global) Limited.
Equipped for the 21st century, White Horse Contractors maintains and operates a large fleet of plant and equipment, undertaking a diversity of operations including earthmoving and landscaping works. The company also pioneered the development of specialist sports field trenchers for use on existing turf surfaces, with full laser grade control and an additional facility for elevating excavated soil directly into transport.
The latest investment, the GKB Drainmaster, is designed to provide a robust solution for the drainage of natural turf sports facilities. Typically used as a secondary drainage treatment over a primary land drainage scheme, the Drainmaster combines the drainage intensity of traditional sand slits with the speed of installation found with the BLEC Sandmaster, thereby creating a highly cost-effective method for the control of excess surface water.
It is suited to all forms of natural turf sports pitches or golf course fairways and can be installed with the minimum of disruption to the facility. The machine excavates 40 mm wide x (up to) 230 mm deep trenches at 1.0 or 0.50 m centres that are simultaneously backfilled with sand or rootzone as part of the same operation.
Spoil from the trenches is elevated cleanly into trailers where it can be removed from the drainage area. Following completion of the secondary drainage operation, the sports surface should be reinstated by overseeding and, where possible, the surface should be top dressed with sand to prolong the serviceable lifespan of the Drainmaster slits.
“The new machines added to our fleet increase our productivity,” said Gary Kneller, White Horse Contractor’s new Managing Director. “The Drainmaster also reduces labour and transport cost which means the surface benefits from improved surface drainage and improved playing capacity without increasing clients’ renovation budgets. The excavated material can also be utilised on-site which further reduces the cost of off-site removal.”
The investment has already started to pay off with the new machine being put straight into work with the installation of secondary drainage as part of a larger pitch renovation project at Chelsea FC’s Training Ground in Cobham, Surrey.
This investment and continued improvement of equipment underlines White Horse Contractor’s commitment to the ‘in-house’ approach which has kept them at the forefront of the industry since 1957.
White Horse Contractors www.whitehorsecontractors.co.uk
BLEC (Global) Limited www.blec.co.uk