Another RoSPA award for Joseph Ash Galvanizing
We’re pleased to report that for the second year running, Joseph Ash Galvanizing has won the Gold Award from RoSPA in recognition of our health and safety standards, performance and systems.
RoSPA is The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents and the award was granted after a panel of judges assessed our health and safety management policies, procedures, systems and our industry leading safety record.
Health and safety is a prime concern for Joseph Ash Galvanizing and we are pleased to be continually recognised for our efforts.
Joseph Ash Galvanizing is made up of many employees, some of whom have worked for the company for many years. Jackie Bates is one such member of the team and we’re lucky to have her!
Jackie has just completed 25 years service with Joseph Ash Galvanizing and remains as hard working today as always. Team members honoured Jackie’s anniversary with a celebratory lunch, some lovely flowers from Steven Hopkins – Joseph Ash Galvanizing’s Managing Director – and some B&Q vouchers.
Congratulations Jackie. 25 years service is a great achievement!
At the end of April 2015, Joseph Ash Galvanizing was proud to announce that our plant at Bilston was awarded OHSAS 18001 status. This was a great achievement for the team at Bilston as this was the only hot dip galvanizing plant in the UK to be awarded the certification.
Joseph Ash Galvanizing promised at that time that our other plants would follow suit by also working towards OHSAS 18001. We are now pleased to report that the Chesterfield plant has become the second plant in the UK to be certified.
OHSAS 18001 is important for the following reasons:
- It is a framework for an occupational health and safety management system
- It reduces workplace hazards and boosts employee morale
- It minimises the risk of production delays
- It provides a safe environment in which to conduct business and operations.
Well done to the team at Chesterfield for working towards the certification!
Customers with enquiries about the OHSAS 18001 Certification are invited to contact Joseph Ash Galvanizing on 0121 504 2560 or via sales@josephash.co.uk.
Joseph Ash Galvanizing buys new team strip for Leek Rugby Under 12s team.
Joseph Ash Galvanizing has sponsored the Leek Rugby Under 12s team strip. This is the second year that Joseph Ash Galvanizing has invested in the team, and plans to do so again next year.
The Leek Rugby Under 12s are based in the Staffordshire Moorlands in a village named Cheddleton. They play extensively throughout Staffordshire and have just started to play teams from Leicestershire and Cheshire.
Joseph Ash Galvanizing decided to sponsor the rugby team as the head coach, Ian Byrne, is the Managing Director of L M Bateman & Co Ltd, a valued customer of Joseph Ash Galvanizing’s Telford plant.
Over the years the Leek Rugby Under 12s team has been very successful:
Under 7:
Matlock Festival Champions
Under 8:
Stoke Festival Champions
Staffordshire County Champions
Lost no games throughout the season
Under 9:
Staffordshire County Champions
Under 10:
Won the Prima Tigers Cup qualifying tournament and represented Leek RUFC with three games at Welford Road (home of Leicester Tigers)
Staffordshire County Champions
Under 12:
Won all their games at Staffordshire County Championships, and finished with the best record.
The team has also welcomed seven girls into the fold, one of which has set up a new girls’ team. This is one of very few girls’ under 12s teams in the country and is an exciting development for the club.
Joseph Ash Galvanizing looks forward to supporting the hard work and team ethic of the Leek Rugby Under 12s in the coming future.
Joseph Ash Galvanizing supports Lily Mae Foundation by playing host to 30 clients at a charity event.
On Friday 10 April Joseph Ash Galvanizing played host to 40 people (including 30 clients) at a charity golf day at The Belfry set up by the Lily Mae Foundation – an organisation created to support parents and families affected by stillbirth or neonatal death. Joseph Ash Galvanizing bought tickets for rounds of golf, seats at the evening dinner, and sponsored a hole and in total helped the charity to raise £9,500.
In an incredibly generous spirit, one of our clients – Churchill Contractors – also donated a further £500 which brought the contribution up to £10,000. Thank you Churchill Contractors! The Lily Mae Foundation also received generous prize donations from another two of our clients, Wright Engineering and BCS Group.
The golf and the evening dinner were great fun and we look forward to the 2016 event.
To see photos of the event visit the Joseph Ash Galvanizing Facebook page or the Joseph Ash Galvanizing Flickr profile.
To find out more about the work of the Lily Mae Foundation, click here.
Bilston plant is currently the only galvanizer in the UK to receive OHSAS 18001.
Joseph Ash Galvanizing has always been proud of its health and safety standards and certifications, and continually strives to protect all employees and visitors who enter their galvanizing plants. The Joseph Ash Bilston site has recently moved a step further than any other galvanizing plant in the UK however by being awarded the OHSAS 18001 Certification.
The Certification to OHSAS 18001 commits Joseph Ash Galvanizing to having a clearly defined management system in place to identify and control health and safety risks. It means that Joseph Ash Bilston can:
- Create processes for continually reviewing and improving occupational health and safety
- Minimise the risk of production delays
- Provide a safe environment in which to do business
- Ensure legal requirements for the industry are adhered to
- Minimise risks of downtime through accidents.
Achieving the certification involved the redevelopment of the existing Bilston health and safety policy to articulate commitments to the continual improvement of health and safety performance. Three members of the Bilston team also completed the required OHSAS 18001 Internal Auditor Training.
Steven Hopkins, Managing Director at Joseph Ash Galvanizing said:
“The team at Joseph Ash Bilston are proud that they’re currently the only galvanizing plant in the UK to receive OHSAS 18001 certification. This is a great achievement for Joseph Ash Galvanizing. Watch this space to see the other Joseph Ash plants follow suit!”
Customers with enquiries about the OHSAS 18001 Certification are invited to contact Joseph Ash Galvanizing on 0121 504 2560 or via sales@josephash.co.uk.
Plan ahead for the 2015 Easter bank holidays. The last date for deliveries is Thursday 2 April.
All Joseph Ash Galvanizing plants will be closed for a few days during the 2015 Easter period on:
Friday 3 April – Good Friday
Monday 6 April – Easter Monday
We will reopen again on Tuesday 7 April.
If you wish to book a Joseph Ash delivery, please contact us as soon as possible. The last date for deliveries is Thursday 2 April.
Enjoy your Easter break!
Hague Construction Ltd engages Joseph Ash Galvanizing to galvanize steel beams for an Essex bridge.
Hague Construction Ltd is a civil engineering and design and build contractor based in Rochester, Kent, specialising in all aspects of in-situ concrete works, ground works, reinforced concrete structures and the design and build of steel framed commercial buildings.
Some of Hague’s partnership agreements include local authorities across the south east such as Kent County Council, Medway Borough Council, Essex County Council and Surrey County Council.
Many of Hague’s projects include highways structures, and as such they were given the task of reconstructing Lexden Bridge in Spring Lane, Colchester, Essex.
The existing Lexden Bridge crosses the channel of the River Colne and was built as a single span structure in 1904, which could only hold a three tonne weight limit.
The primary elements of the existing steel bridge superstructure consisted of two lattice girder edge beams, 13.44 metres in length, which spanned longitudinally between mass concrete abutments and with a transverse spanning deck. The deck was constructed of steel transverse members in-filled with mass concrete. The clear span between the face of the abutments was 12.18 metres.
Due to the age and structure of the bridge, Essex County Council commissioned Hague Construction to demolish the bridge and replace it with a new reinforced concrete bridge.
The abutments will be supported on CFA piles and the raised height of the new bridge deck will require a change to the vertical alignment of the carriageway.
A temporary footbridge and footpath will also be constructed to maintain pedestrian access across the River Colne and a coffer dam is required to enable the abutments to be constructed.
The Lexden Bridge project is part of a programme of works, which will feature on Channel 5 in 2015 as part of a six-part documentary about local authority engineering works.
Joseph Ash Galvanizing is pleased to have assisted Hague Construction in this project, after we were asked to hot dip galvanize the steel components of the bridge, and deliver them direct to the site in Colchester.
We look forward to seeing the bridge finished and we’ll publicise the date of the Channel 5 documentary when we know its scheduling.
A stunning force of nature.
US award winning writer, Alice Walker, once said: “Horses make a landscape look beautiful.” At Joseph Ash Galvanizing we couldn’t agree more, especially when we were asked to hot dip galvanize these amazing steel horses by artist Andy Scott.
Andy Scott is a Scottish sculptor who graduated from the Glasgow School of Art in the mid eighties. Andy hand-crafts figurative steel fabrications ranging from 2.5 to 30 metres in height, in order to create stunning works of art that can be seen across the UK and internationally. (You can see many of Andy’s works on his website).
To protect the steel from rusting, as well as to give the fabrications a beautiful shine, Andy requires his artworks to be galvanized before public placement, and he has often used Joseph Ash Galvanizing for the large-scale works.
These stunning equine sculptures, which are made up of five horses in total – a standing stallion and four galloping horses – were galvanized at Joseph Ash’s Telford plant in the Autumn of 2014.
The horses varied in size from 2.5 to 3.5 metres tall, and due to their complex shapes and intricate forms, they had to be handled extremely carefully.
The Joseph Ash Telford plant has a large galvanizing bath, which meant that the horses could be dipped in their entirety to ensure an even galvanized coating.
Andy said:
“Joseph Ash’s large capacity tanks allow me to create works which have dimensions over the restrictions of most normal tanks.
“My sculptures always require special handling and the team at Telford always deliver an excellent job, ensuring a great finish to the works I’ve often taken many months to create.
“It can be nerve-wracking entrusting my creative works to others to finish, but I have always been delighted with the end results, the quick turnaround, and the friendly service offered in handling my unique projects.”
The horse sculptures have ended up on a private estate in Long Island, New York. At Joseph Ash, we’re pleased that Andy chose us to hot dip galvanize the horses as we enjoyed being a part of this unique project and are proud to have taken part in their journey.
As 2014 comes to a close we are pleased to announce some substantial new additions to our plant in Chesterfield – exciting improvements which form part of a major investment drive and facilities upgrade.
Over the past few years Joseph Ash Galvanizing has invested heavily in the various plants across the Midlands by increasing bath sizes and procuring new fleets of trucks. It also successfully acquired a new plant in Sittingbourne, to service customers in the South East. As 2014 comes to a close Joseph Ash is still investing, but this time at the Chesterfield plant, where major developments are already underway.
If you’ve been following our social media posts on Facebook and Linkedin, you will have seen our photos about land being cleared and flattened. Despite the teasing nature of these photos, we can now reveal that we are adding another huge hardstanding bay to the Chesterfield plant – an area that can house up to 100 trailers.
The developed land will also include an area where customers can trial erect their fabrications before taking them off-site and delivering them to the end user. We hope that the ability to test the assembly of steel fabrications will save our customers much time and money on large projects.
We will also be improving our ability to handle customers’ work with the addition of an extra crane gantry area, providing us with the ability to load several customers’ vehicles or containers at a time. Customers preferring to load their own containers or carry out pre-site assembly or other processes will also be able to use this facility.
Other developments at the Chesterfield plant will include:
- Additional concrete storage space
- Extension of the fork-lift fleet
- Container loading facilities including ramps and bays
- Extra racking
- Local overnight facilities and changing facilities for truck drivers
- Offices and telecoms for customer use
- MPI crack detection
- Factory space (up to 2000m2 currently available) suitable for fabrication or assembly.
Hereford
With regret, we are proposing to close our Hereford operation in the spring of 2015. There has been a mounting requirement for significant investment in the Hereford factory over recent years which likely future returns do not justify, and capital will be better invested in our other plants.
Existing Hereford customers will be serviced from the company’s six other plants. Three of these plants include the widest galvanizing bath in the country at Telford, the deepest galvanizing bath at Bilston, near Wolverhampton, and the second longest bath in the UK at Chesterfield.
The year ahead in 2015
The New Year will see Joseph Ash Galvanizing continuing to go from strength to strength. As the work at the Chesterfield plant becomes complete we will share the results with you. We also plan to share other developments that benefit our customers in the years to come.
If you have any questions or queries about the plans at Chesterfield, please contact David Carling – Chesterfield Divisional Manager on 01246 854650.