Schwing Stetter

Schwing GmbH was founded by the 25 year-old master mechanic, Friedrich Wilhelm Schwing in the Ruhr Area of Germany on 17th March 1934 as a manufacturer of equipment for the concrete industry. His products quickly found customers in the mining and road construction industries as well as building. From the beginning his passion focused on the development and manufacture of concrete construction machinery, which is still today’s core business.

Friedrich Wilhelm Schwing was always looking to innovate with products capable of making the users’ work easier, more efficient and more economical. Many of his developments and patents were pioneering feats of engineering and ahead of his own time. In the early years, Schwing designed tower cranes which could be transported un-dismantled and universal climbing cranes which could take support on the already hardened floor slab below the topmost slab and which could therefore follow the building progress.

At the beginning of the fifties, concrete had become the core construction product on sites all over the world. People were starting to recognise the limitations of discontinuous conveyance of concrete using cranes and crane skips. Different methods were put to the test, including a pneumatic concrete conveyor from Schwing developed in the early fifties.

In 1957 the company brought out a major technological advance with its first hydraulically powered, twin cylinder concrete pump. The design principle which was adopted by almost all other manufacturers, is still the standard design worldwide today.

The Stetter company which was registered in 1945 working out of a blacksmith’s workshop in Memmingen, began very early to specialize in the design of concrete mixing equipment.

In 1958, Stetter launched the era of ready-mix concrete with the first truck mixer. Two years later, Stetter was providing concrete filling stations for truck mixers, and by 1964 the company was building large-scale concrete mixing plants.

In 1965, Schwing put the first truck-mounted concrete pump on the market which was completed by a concrete placing boom only 3 years later. This was another milestone in the history of construction machines.

A few years later, in 1973 Schwing built the first truck-mounted concrete pumps which had a 45m large-scale placing boom. In the same year, Schwing created a new product division: “Industrial and environmental engineering”. This was the beginning of the serious production of sludge pumps specially developed for industrial applications, a field of activity where Schwing is still one of the world leaders.

Around the same time, Stetter also became active in the environmental engineering field by putting the first residual concrete recycling plant on the market in 1976.

On the 8th March 1982, Schwing GmbH took over Stetter GmbH in order to provide a complete range of concrete handling equipment. Since then, the whole spectrum of products ranging from the production of concrete, transport and placing down to the recycling of residual concrete is all available from a single source.

Less than a month later, on the 1st Apr, 1982, another major milestone was passed when Schwing filed their US patent for the revolutionary "Rock valve". This new technology altered the playing field completely as it used the high pressure in the system to help seal the valve rather than work against it which was the limitation of previous valves.

Since then numerous concrete pumping world records have been achieved using Schwing Stetter equipment including the highest vertical distance set on the Parbati Hydroelectric Project in Himachal Pradesh, Northern India, when a stationary Schwing pump succeeded in pumping concrete up to a height of 715 metres!

In 2001, Gerhard Schwing became the sole owner and CEO of the Schwing group.

On the 6th of July 2012 the Chinese equipment manufacturer XCMG acquired a majority 52% shareholding in the Schwing Group. The deal, which had been under discussion since April 2012, was completed in Essen, Germany.

Burlington Engineers

Burlington Engineers Ltd was incorporated in 1946 as 'Modern Tractors' and began trading from Old Burlington Street in London’s West End as an exporter of UK Construction equipment. George Kluger began working for the company a few years later.

The aim of the company was always to maintain a high standard of service to our customers and fulfill their needs in all areas of their operations.

The company developed its business activities over the years as sole UK and, in many cases, Irish distributor of specialist construction equipment to the civil engineering and building industries and process equipment to other industries. The company changed its name to Burlington Engineers Ltd.

The manufacturers represented were well established, internationally renowned companies whose equipment was present in construction and industrial applications throughout the world.

Since those early days, the company has supplied a diverse range of Schwing concrete pumping and placing equipment for use on the construction of concrete gravity platforms, nuclear power stations, major tunnelling projects (The Channel Tunnel), residential, industrial and office complexes including the high rise towers at Canary Wharf.

The company marketed and supplied both the equipment and the supporting spare parts and in addition provides service facilities, where applicable.

In the early 1950’s the company made a fundamental and major contribution to the UK foundation sector by importing the first Delmag diesel pile hammer. In 1962, Burlington Engineers Limited was appointed the UK and Irish distributor of Messrs F W Schwing GmbH, the pioneer of the oil hydraulic twin cylinder reciprocating concrete pump.

The 1960's also marked the company's first move of premises to a small estate in Park Royal, having more room to work while still being near to the centre of London.

In 1975 the Kluger family bought into the business, buying 50% between George Kluger and his son John.

The business moved again in 1980 to the current address in Perivale, conveniently closer to both the soon to be constructed M40 and M25 while still being near to the centre of London. As one of the first businesses on this estate, they were able to negotiate an optimum floor-plan and layout of the factory and office space.

The Kluger family increase their share in the business during the 1980's with John taking a 50% share and then taking over the business completely in the early 2000's.

On the 11th March 1993 Burlington Engineers, was awarded a quality system accreditation approved by British Standard Institute. This was upgraded to the new standard BS EN ISO 9001:2000 in December 2002.

In 2006 John Kluger sold Burlington Engineers to Schwing GmbH. The current management took over in February 2007 and the company name officially changed to Schwing Stetter (UK) Limited on the 12th July 2007.