An American-designed Jaeger truckmixer, manufactured in Britain by Ransomes & Rapier Ltd The Dawn of the Ready-Mixed Industry A brief commercial history of the first 50 years from 1913 to 1963 By Michael J. Arthur

hen the author It is difficult to pin down the recognized the opportunities for entered the exact starting point of ready- supplying other contractors. By ready-mixed mixed concrete production. A 1925 there were some 25 plants concrete business widely quoted date is 1913 but in production, and by 1929 over oWf Trent Gravels Ltd of other sources suggest it could 100 concrete-mixing plants were Attenborough, Nottingham, have been even earlier, depending in existence throughout the US. in 1960, the ready-mixed upon how the term is interpreted. This is the standard story of concrete industry in the UK In 1913, when the first load of the development of ready-mixed was still in its infancy. At that ready-mixed concrete is said to concrete, which credits the time there were people have been delivered by an Americans with the invention of American in Baltimore, concrete what has become the main source around who had been in was commonly mixed by hand, of the material for ‘ready-mix’ from the start but in 1916 Stephan Stepanian of work. In his paper entitled ‘The and some of what follows is Columbus, Ohio, filed a patent for growth of the ready-mixed based on their published a truckmixer. This was rejected, concrete industry in Great comments, the remainder on however, and the ‘transit mixer’ Britain’, however, Peter Jackson their private recollections took another 10 years to tells of a Mr Deacon, Liverpool’s and the author’s own materialize and to deliver the first Borough and Water Engineer, who experience from the early load of truck-mixed concrete in in 1872 carried out tests to satisfy 1960s. This article formed 1926. In the meantime (believed himself that concrete compacted the basis of a presentation to to be in 1922 or 1923) a building 20–30min after mixing gave better the Midlands branch of The materials supplier from Danville, results than when used Institute of Quarrying in Virginia, bought a concrete mixing immediately. Over the next five 2003. plant for his own use and soon years he went on to lay some

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An American non- agitating tipper truck from Wellings’ article

Loading wet Hauling with sides On site sides are Body is tipped With sides concrete: body in V position swung to vertical, and restricted vertical, the track sides in V position redistributing gate opened to can carry stone grout give a limited or other bulk mixing action material

100,000yd 3 of concrete ‘after end of the 1920s there were no as 1945, D.C. Hay of Kuert being mixed in and carried from central mixing plants in the UK. In Concrete Inc. was reporting that the nearest available yard’. the March 1930 edition of his company used nothing but Jackson’s paper also records Cement, Lime and Gravel , however, non-agitating tippers to deliver that ‘ready-mixed concrete’ was the editor made the following 55,000yd 3 of ready-mixed used in the construction of the comment: ‘Our conservative concrete a year, over distances of Admiralty Harbour at Dover in nation is famous for its care in up to 28 miles from the plant. 1898 and in one section of the accepting new ideas and this has J.L. Wellings quoted the capital work there were two 1yd 3 delayed the introduction of ready- outlay for a central mixing plant mixers, each producing 100yd 3 of mixed concrete here.’ But he installation and trucks in 1930 as concrete a day. added: ‘It’s got to come’, and being £20,000 for a modest unit So Peter Jackson’s article, indeed it did. Simon McPherson’s and up to £90,000 for a large one published in the March 1957 comment accompanied an article incorporating a 3yd 3 mixer. The edition of the magazine Cement, entitled ‘Ready-mixed concrete truckmixer fleet would account Lime and Gravel , puts a new and central mixing plants’ by J.L. for some 60% of this outlay, with complexion on the history of Wellings of Millars Machinery Co. a 2yd 3 machine costing some ready-mixed concrete, although he Ltd, which was claimed to be the £2,000. He commented that one does admit that the term is now first comprehensive article on the company had 86 trucks in use, only applied to the situation where subject published in the UK. another 64, and observed that the producer ‘sells’ concrete to a Wellings described the several large plants had this user, and this is what is supposed situation in the US industry in the number handling their output! to have happened first in Baltimore 1920s and distinguished between in 1913. concrete from ‘central mixing Britain in the plants’ and ‘truck- or transit- 1930s The background to mixed concrete’. The former he The person credited with being developments in classified as ‘stationary’ and ‘semi- first off the mark in the UK was Britain portable’ for the production of Kjeld Ammentorp, a Dane, who Although the industry ‘took off’ wet-mixed materials, and both of had witnessed the introduction of in the US during the 1920s, post- them for mixing dry materials. ready-mixed concrete in Ammentorp’s 1930 World War I Britain experienced The plants illustrated varied in Copenhagen in the mid-1920s. He plant at Bedfont no such development and at the appearance, but each contained formed a company called Ready the essential elements of Mixed Concrete Ltd in July 1930 aggregate and cement storage. and erected the UK’s first plant Bulk cement handling through the on land owned by Hall & Co. at use of an ‘air-conveying system’ Bedfont, near Staines in was considered more satisfactory Middlesex. Peter Jackson refers to than the use of bagged cement. him as the ‘father’ of the British The vehicles used for delivering ready-mixed concrete industry, low-slump wet-mixed concrete and indeed he was. Having were either standard tippers or selected such an appropriate those with specially built name for his business, he was to V-shaped bodies, while tipping become a guiding light for several ‘agitators’ were employed for of the people running the conveying higher-slump mixes. companies that were to follow. Non-tipping, horizontal-drum The Bedfont plant included a truckmixers, which incorporated 2yd 3 mixer and was fed from four a scroll of blades, were rotated in 100yd 3 aggregate bins. Cement one direction to mix the dry was initially handled in bags, as batch, and in the other to bulk cement handling systems discharge the mixed concrete. It were not readily available in is interesting to note that as late Britain at the time. Gravel and

20 www.qmj.co.uk QM July 2004 Concrete Review sand were handled by a bucket elevator and the plant had an output of up to 40yd 3/h, which was discharged into six truck- mounted agitators, each capable 2 3 of transporting 1 ⁄3yd of concrete. His vehicle fleet consisted of Chevrolets and subsequently included Studebakers. Ammentorp was said to have started with a capital of £6,000 and through the production of a modest 8,636yd 3 in 1931 he generated a turnover of £10,000, but suffered a net trading loss of £399. Demand gradually increased, however, particularly as Middlesex County Council saw the benefit of ready-mixed concrete in its road-improvement schemes. Following the start-up at Bedfont, the next company to appear on the scene were Scientific Controlled Concrete Co. Ltd, who went into business at nearby Staines in 1934. The about the Jaeger system of ready- but, in time, also throughout The first Rapier plant company used the American- mixed concrete production to much of the rest of the world. at Attenborough designed Jaeger truckmixers, supply into the Nottingham– which were supplied by Derby–Leicester market area. Trent Gravels Ltd Ransomes & Rapier Ltd of Their Jaeger dry-batching plant Trent Gravels entered discussions Ipswich, but Scientific soon went came into operation in 1939 and with Jaeger Truck Mixers out of business, with some of in many respects was similar to (England) Ltd, sole licensees for their plant subsequently being Express Supply Concrete’s Jaeger truckmixers manufactured acquired by Truck Mixed installations, using bulk cement by Ransomes & Rapier, in 1937. Concrete (Southampton). and Jaeger-designed 2yd 3 The company also took soundings Another company using horizontal-drum truckmixers, from Express Supply Concrete in agitators and American 5yd 3 driven by a separate on-board 1938 to arrive at an estimated transit-mixers in the early 1930s engine. The plant and the outlay of £5,500 for the plant and were British Steel Piling Co. This truckmixers at Attenborough £6,500 for six ERF lorries with company and , who were supplied by Ransomes & mixers and a garage. On an owned two truckmixers, collected Rapier Ltd. expected annual output of their own purchases of concrete. Thus, prior to the onset of 26,000yd 3, projected operating Next were Jaeger System World War II, there were only costs for the plant were 1s 6d Concrete Ltd, who established a five known operators of ready- per cubic yard and for the fleet, base in Glasgow and subsequently mixed concrete plants in Britain. 4s 2d. With materials averaging 1 operated under the name of Of these only Ammentorp’s 16s ⁄2d, and 3d thrown in for Trumix Concrete, later becoming Ready Mixed Concrete Ltd were contingencies, production costs part of the Tilcon organization. using a central mixing plant with totalled 22s per cubic yard. In 1936 Express Supply agitators at their Bedfont depot. Expected profit per cubic yard Concrete Ltd were founded as a Elsewhere, such as in Germany, was 2s 6d. subsidiary company of Balfour ready-mixed concrete was also The batching plant was supplied Beatty Ltd. They operated two starting to become established on with aggregates by belt conveyor plants, the first at Paddington, and the construction scene. The year from the gravel plant, while bulk the second at Alperton, served by 1939, however, was a momentous cement deliveries were handled a total of 30 Jaeger truckmixers, one in construction terms on the by a Fuller Kinyon pump (not but of 2yd 3 capacity. other side of the world. It was in unlike a vacuum cleaner and an The only other company to set that year that Sam Stirling, an updated version of the equipment up in business as a ready-mixed Australian entrepreneur, installed by Express), which concrete supplier in the 1930s established a plant in the heart of elevated the cement from the were Trent Gravels Ltd of Sydney and succeeded in ground-level storage to bins Attenborough, near Nottingham. registering his company as Ready above the weighing floor of the As a company, they had begun by Mixed Concrete Ltd throughout plant. extracting gravel and sand from Australia. His company logo, the Again, like Express, Trent the deposits in the Trent Valley 75 word ‘Readymix’, said to be in his Gravels established a brick-built years ago in 1929 and by 1937 own handwriting, was to become laboratory to house cement- were beginning to make enquiries established not only in Australia, testing equipment, a

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One of Trent Gravels’ bucket elevator, which discharged first trucks into a two-compartment silo. From here cement was drawn on demand through an air-slide into a blowing chamber to be conveyed pneumatically to the storage silos at the top of the plant. Pressurized tanker vehicles also delivered cement from the early 1960s onwards. Aggregates were again supplied direct from the aggregate plant by belt conveyor and the batching operation was conducted through an electro-pneumatic push-button sand-moisture tester, aggregate a rapid increase in trade for system and weigh dials, the sieves, concrete cube-making concrete from Attenborough for operator referring to batching equipment and a hand-operated new council-owned housing, road cards giving the weights of Denison cube compression- improvements and, in the middle materials required for particular testing machine. Initial advice on of the decade, emergency sea- volumes of mixed concrete. mix design, testing and quality defence work when Trent Greater throughputs were control was under the Gravels’ truckmixers were achieved through this plant, supervision of R.H. Harry Stanger. supplying concrete to the east especially with the introduction of The rapid onset of the war coast, some 50 miles away. larger-capacity, high-discharge brought added complications to Demand continued to increase, truckmixers (at first 4yd 3 capacity the new business, not least being so much so that a new central and then 6yd 3). The 1960s were the unforeseen demand for mixing plant was established by proving to be a boom time for concrete for bunkers, shelters, the company at Mansfield and construction work, which in the runways and holding areas for shortly afterwards in 1958 the area included the M1 motorway, military hardware. The Ransomes & Rapier lever- an expansion of the University of Attenborough site was within a controlled, dry-batch plant at Nottingham, eventually to include mile of the MoD’s Chilwell Attenborough was the University Hospital, as well as Ordnance Depot and, under decommissioned when a Blaw- the development of many private wartime conditions, the ready- Knox plant, similar to the one at housing estates and inner-city, mixed concrete operation Mansfield but housing two 3yd 3 multi-storey rehousing schemes. virtually came under the control Winget drum mixers, came on One notable contract for of the local commanding officer stream there too. Attenborough material was of the Royal Engineers. The small This new plant, which supplied Nottingham’s new Playhouse team of men associated with a fleet of 22 Attenborough-based Theatre, which exhibits a fine Trent Gravels’ concrete horizontal-drum truckmixers (a array of concrete both inside and operations were immediately belt-and-braces approach which out, and, in recent years, was placed on the list of reserved contrasted with the use of given an award as a commendable occupations and were deemed to agitators at Mansfield), was example of 1960s’ architecture. be essential to the war effort at supplied with bulk cement home. delivered in tippers, which Post-World War II The end of the 1940s began to discharged into a receiving developments see a slow recovery after the war, hopper. The hopper was emptied In the 1950s plants started to but it was the 1950s that brought by a screw conveyor feeding a appear in and around the major cities of Birmingham, Leeds, Leicester, Liverpool, Manchester and Newcastle, in addition to the greater London area. There were two schools of thought — one favouring a large mixing plant with delivery vehicles on an average haul to site of around 7 miles, or, alternatively, a series of small dry-batch plants using a pool of truckmixers. By 1963, when the international ready-mixed concrete industry reached it’s notional half century and Trent Gravels Ltd were about to celebrate 25 years in the trade, there were many suppliers Loading an agitator at of ready-mixed concrete in Trent Gravels’ existence. Already by far the Mansfield plant largest of these were Australian

24 www.qmj.co.uk QM July 2004 Concrete Review company Ready Mixed Concrete A high-discharge truck Ltd (subsequently to become working on the M1 in simply RMC), who had entered the early 1960s Britain in 1951 when Sam Stirling sent his envoy, Bryan Kelman, to spy out the prospects. In 1952 Kelman arranged a deal worth £92,500 for the purchase of Ammentorp’s operation, which had commissioned a new £28,000 plant two years earlier and by that time was capable of producing some 50,000yd 3 a year. From that year onwards Ready Mixed Concrete Ltd grew rapidly through acquisitions and new developments by the go-ahead team headed by Kelman, which included fellow Australian With so many companies USA 30 years earlier. Today the Norman Davis and British civil entering the industry so quickly, country boasts some 1,500 engineer John Camden, who was some of the pioneers saw the depots and a production of to succeed Kelman on the latter’s sense of forming and being part ready-mixed concrete that has return to Australia in 1965 to of the British Ready-Mixed peaked at four times the 1960s head up CSR. Trent Gravels Concrete Association (BRMCA), figure and is currently around 30 themselves became part of the which not only shaped the early million yd 3 a year. Clearly, despite RMC group before the decade technical standards for the periodic downturns, the early was out and their concrete industry, but also provided a prediction of a healthy future for operations were taken into the valuable forum for the exchange the industry, by the editor of group’s Sheffield-based regional of ideas. Trent Gravels played Cement, Lime and Gravel , has come company. their part in this too, with true over the 70 years since it Other major players by 1963 chairman J. Stanleigh Turner and was made. included Hall & Ham River, managing director Ken Potter Trumix, Mixconcrete and Premix, elected as early BRMCA Bibliography all of whom were later absorbed chairmen, while Roy Arthur, their CASSELL, M.: ‘The Readymixers — into larger concerns: Halls to production and technical manager the story of RMC’, Pencorp Books, RMC; Trumix to Tilcon and thence since the 1940s, served on the 1986. to Anglo-American’s technical committees. Directory of Quarries and Pits 1963–64 , subsidiary; Mixconcrete to At its formation in 1950 The Quarry Managers’ Journal Ltd. Pioneer and then to ; and BRMCA boasted 21 members Directory of Quarries, Pits and Quarry Premix (Amey) to ARC and with 41 plants, but by 1963 the Equipment 2003–2004 , QMJ Publishing thereby to Hanson. There were of number of member companies Ltd. course many more, with ‘catchy’ had quadrupled to 82, with a total HAY, D.C.: ‘Ready-mixed concrete names, who are now believed to of 308 plants in operation. haulage in non-agitating equipment’, be lost in the mists of time: In the early 1960s the British Cement, Lime & Gravel , 1946. Automix, Exactamix, Finamix, industry’s total output exceeded JACKSON, G.P.: ‘The growth of the Mass-ter Mix, Mobilmix, Rotamix, 10 million yd 3 of ready-mixed ready-mixed concrete industry in Tufmix and Welmix — to name concrete, a figure approximately Great Britain’, Cement, Lime & Gravel , but a few! equivalent to the output in the 1956. KELMAN, B.N.: ‘Ready-mixed Trent Gravels working on a road job in the post-war years concrete and its significance for the aggregate industry’, Cement, Lime & Gravel , 1963. WELLINGS, J.L.: ‘Ready-mixed concrete and central mixing plants’, Cement, Lime & Gravel , 1930. WIGMORE, V.S.: ‘Ready-mixed concrete’, The Reinforced Concrete Review , 1961.

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