Client: Lovell
Duration: 16 weeks
Value: £2,100,000
Contract Description
As part of the £250 million contract awarded by the Ministry of Defence(MOD) to Lovell to build more than 900 new homes for troops and their families relocating from Germany to the Salisbury Plain in South Wiltshire, Les Searle secured the earthworks contract on the largest of these developments at Larkhill for 450 houses.
Works commenced with stripping and relocation of 70,000m3 of topsoil and subsoils prior to 160,000m3 cut & fill chalk engineering. As part of the earthmoving contract Les Searle excavated and re-engineered extensive areas of tunnels and trenches excavated by troops training during World War 1.
The programme requirements necessitated the earthworks commencing out of season and the requirement to lime modify chalk to meet specification requirements. This was achieved by disking lime in to each layer of chalk fill prior to compaction. As with most of the larger contracts Les Searle had established an independent UKAS laboratory on site with full time technician supported by setting out and survey engineers. Working to Lovell Phased completion programme each Phase was completed and hand over ahead of programme allowing the infrastructure to commence.
Layer control and final trim was achieved with extensive use of GPS full machine control dozers.
The main earthworks were undertaken with 3 teams of 50t excavators, 40 & 50t dumptrucks, D6 and D8 dozers and self-propelled rollers with water imported by road tankers for dust suppression. Following completion of bulk earthworks 40,000m3 of topsoil and subsoil was screened for use within the housing development.
