Kocurek Excavators: “For us Strenx is the obvious option”

At the factory in Ipswich, England there is something going on in every corner. One person, it seems, is always present everywhere. David Kocurek, founder and owner director of Kocurek Excavators is a problem solver, and he moves around the factory with ease. He is used to it after over three decades and having built the factory himself together with his family.

“We never received a faulty steel plate from SSAB,” he explained.

Kocurek has been using SSAB’s steel in their products for decades and finds that the material has several benefits. One of them is that it is so easy to work. 

“The key benefit for our company is that we can achieve the high technical results required from the product while welding under normal conditions. I think that is the most important thing for me,” said David Kocurek.

One other benefit has been that SSAB’s plate products are delivered blasted and primed, without any scale or rust on them. 

“With the primer we have been able to weld straight on to the plates without any prior cleaning. That is an added benefit with SSAB’s plates. It has saved us a lot of time over the years.”

The demolition excavators’ arms have a length of up to 70 meters. They need to be able to withstand extreme forces when they literarily tear buildings down, piece by piece. The use of SSAB’s Strenx® performance steel supports the strength and helps saving weight. 

“We are always pushing the limits of what we are achieving with the excavators. We need to make the arms as high as possible, as our customers constantly want to go higher. That is why it is so important that the steel has good fatigue resistance. So, we try to save weight by using a thinner material. Naturally we need to maintain strength, so we select SSAB’s Strenx 700 steel to maintain the strength while reducing the thickness of the plate,” said David Kocurek.

Kocurek’s quality products are in high demand all over the world. As an industry leader, the company exports equipment all throughout Europe. The company also ships to the United States, Philippines and India. Recently there has been a lot of orders being sent to Australia.

“It is very satisfying to have customers traveling from Australia to order equipment from us, and we are sending equipment to all corners of the globe,” he said.

In one of the factory’s office rooms David’s niece, Rebecca Kelly, is dealing with spare part orders and service administration. She has worked for Kocurek for the past eight years and being one of the family members here she is used to discussions about the company around the dinner table on Sundays. From her perspective it is paramount to use quality material in the products manufactured by Kocurek.

“We are very privileged to have been able to join the My Inner Strenx program, it is reassurance to our customers that we are using the best quality materials, as well as the best quality processes and practices. The My Inner Strenx logo makes it simple and straightforward, you look at a product and you know it is approved,” said Rebecca Kelly.

For the manufacturing process long steel plates are required for the long reach and high reach equipment. SSAB has been able to supply Kocurek with larger plate sizes so the product can be put together with fewer joins. 

“When you are building something very long, the fewer joins the better. One of the key points where SSAB has helped us is with sheets that we can use effectively and efficiently for our design, and that are suitable as well as durable for the equipment,” said Rebecca Kelly.

The equipment from Kocurek is sent out to stand the test of time in working conditions where tremendous forces, and the many repetition of these forces, are involved. That is why Kocurek has to use a product that will cope over a long period of time. This is what the customers are paying for.

“People expect something to last if they are putting out a lot of money, so for us Strenx steel is the obvious option. It is a quality product going into our quality demolition equipment.”