German Design and Ingenuity

Putzmeister America
Written by Robert Hoshowsky

Since 1958, the name Putzmeister has been synonymous with quality. The Putzmeister Group was founded in Germany and is a global leader in manufacturing innovative, exceptionally reliable, long-lasting equipment for concrete and material placing clients in construction, mining, power station, sewage treatment, waste incinerator, tunnel construction, and other large-scale industrial project sectors.
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Putzmeister Concrete Pumps GmbH was created in Germany’s Baden-Württemberg region, an area known for its outstanding manufacturing. The 1970s saw Putzmeister set-up operations in France, Great Britain, Spain, Italy, and Brazil. In the 1980s, the company added additional equipment to its roster when it acquired California-based Thomsen, Inc. And in 1994, the business took another bold step forward with the opening of Putzmeister America, Inc., its North American headquarters and manufacturing facility in Wisconsin.

“Putzmeister is a very well-known brand, and even the largest pumper in the world is our customer,” says Putzmeister Vice President of Sales and Marketing Bill Dwyer. Dwyer has over twenty two years of experience with Putzmeister in the concrete pumping industry.

A hallmark of the company is that most of the products are engineered in Germany. Putzmeister America also has product design responsibilities. Putzmeister America supports a wide range of products and gains input about what North and Latin American customers require. This knowledge is then transferred to the engineers in Germany, to address when they design a new pump.

Putzmeister’s line of products is precision designed, engineered and manufactured to the highest possible standards to perform at peak efficiency for years. It makes everything from truck-mounted concrete boom pumps to trailer-mounted concrete pumps, separate placing booms, Telebelt® truck-mounted telescopic belt conveyors, tunneling machinery, fireproofing pumps, and more.

The company’s machinery is used on residential and commercial construction projects, mining, oil and gas, energy, and other highly-demanding job sites. The equipment maintains a very high resale value for many reasons, from overall quality and structural integrity, to aftermarket support.

Putzmeister maintains a vast inventory of spare parts for its products, so that customers purchasing a twenty-year-old trade-in will be able to find replacement components through the company’s parts department. “We might not have any more [of that part] on the shelf, but we have somebody collecting all the data and looking to get that part,” states Dwyer. “At Putzmeister, we will always support our products throughout the whole product life, and not just for the first five years or so.”

The company’s dependable pumps are used daily in demanding conditions, and represent a significant investment in the fleet of its customers. When clients are ready to upgrade, they return to Putzmeister. “Some of the trade-in pumps are 15 to 20 years old. This is a testament to the longevity of Putzmeister Pumps,” comments Dwyer.

Putzmeister’s highly versatile pumps are used on some of the largest construction projects across the Americas and worldwide. Among the recent high-profile projects using Putzmeister machinery are the Panama Canal Expansion and the Hoover Dam Bypass Bridge.

Over the years, the company’s equipment has been used on many world-famous, record-shattering projects recognized by Guinness World Records. These include the largest continuous concrete pour for the tallest structure west of the Mississippi and the new 1,100-foot-tall, 73-storey Wilshire Grand in downtown Los Angeles.

For these, The Conco Construction Companies (Conco) – one of America’s biggest pumping and belt businesses – coordinated a fleet of pumps, including sixteen units from Putzmeister America, for a record-breaking 21,200 cubic yard mat pour.

Being involved with very tall buildings is not new for Putzmeister. The company’s specially-designed BSA 14000 SHP-D powerful concrete pump for high-rise structures can reach 3,000 meters vertically and 500 meters horizontally and was used during the construction of the 2,717-foot-tall Burj Khalifa (formerly known as Burj Dubai), in the United Arab Emirates.

“This extreme pump height was possible due to the trust and cooperation developed between the Samsung-led team, the concrete supplier, and pumping service for the project, Unimix, the local Putzmeister agent German Gulf Enterprises (GGE), as well as Putzmeister Concrete Pumps GmbH,” said Christian Stirm, application engineer at Putzmeister’s global headquarters in Aichtal, Germany. The Burj Khalifa was completed in 2010.

The sheer height of the structure was challenging. Faced with this, the Putzmeister BSA 14000 SHP-D frame and hopper were reinforced to endure the massive forces exerted by the concrete. About 5,826,920 cubic feet of concrete were pumped over thirty-two months.

Putzmeister machinery has been used in many other projects including San Francisco’s Oakland Bay Bridge, a massive floodwall to protect New Orleans against future disasters in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, and The National September 11 Memorial & Museum at the site of New York’s World Trade Center.

Putzmeister’s energy sector projects include the Queensland Curtis LNG (QCLNG) on Australia’s Curtis Island in Gladstone Harbour. The project is responsible for converting liquefied natural gas (LNG) into cleaner, greener hydrocarbon energy for export markets.

Putzmeister America’s staff work with newcomers in the industry, introducing them to the company’s product lines, which include boom pumps, Telebelts belt conveyors, and trailer pumps. “We like to get the customer familiar with Putzmeister and what we offer in regard to service and technology,” says Dwyer. “Ideally, if we have been successful, the customer will purchase their first pump from Putzmeister.”

Putzmeister acknowledged its historic sixtieth anniversary by hosting a VIP event at the annual World of Concrete held in Las Vegas in January. The company looks forward to the World of Concrete as the only annual international tradeshow focused on the concrete/construction and masonry sectors. The Putzmeister sales and engineering teams are on hand to interact with customers and present existing and new product developments.

“The company uses trade shows like the World of Concrete to gain market feedback on its product designs,” states Dwyer. “This type of open communication with the customer base is a hallmark of Putzmeister’s success,” he says.

“We pride ourselves on providing the same level of service for customers with fleets ranging from just one pump, up to those exceeding 800!” says Dwyer. “We have a technical service group which provides on-site expertise to customers throughout the Americas, a full spare parts inventory, as well as telephone support.”

Putzmeister – Close to your business.

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