Betonstar reaches higher with lighter weight through Strenx® steel

Even before Turkish concrete pump manufacturer Betonstar was established in 2008, its founders were familiar with SSAB’s Strenx® performance steel met the company’s expectations and more. So, when they considered the two primary things that provided customer satisfaction – lighter weight and high safety –they knew the way forward was to continue using different Strenx® steel in their products.

Erol Yıldız, factory manager at Betonstar, is involved in day-to-day production, and he is very familiar with the high-strength steel from SSAB and its key benefits.

“In our products, we have to provide the smallest possible weight combined with the highest possible safety,” he says. “Workers need to be safe when operating these products. We can only achieve this with SSAB steel products. We use Strenx in all steel structures of the concrete pumps. And we love using this material because it gives us high-quality results in production while cutting, welding and bending.”

The R&D design team started off making steel booms using Strenx® 700 steel and then moved on to Strenx® 900 steel for longer products that needed to reach higher. The thickness range is between 3 and 50 millimeters (0.1 to 2.0 inches), and the lightweight design enhances sustainability.

“Our products are utilized in all sorts of construction sites, from a small building in a tiny village to the highest towers of the world,” Yıldız says. “Our concrete pumps are mounted on the customer’s trucks, and the fact that the pumps weigh less provides many advantages, such as less fuel consumption, the possibility of purchasing trucks with a shorter wheelbase and pouring concrete with less fuel – and, of course, less fuel consumption when driving the lighter truck.”

The people on the design team at the company second that.

“We’re always looking to come up with new and longer boom designs and to originate new lightweight solutions,” says Selim Alver, R&D manager at Betonstar. Even one kilo [2.2 pounds] less in our product means that the customer carries less weight. And this leads to less fuel consumption.”

Betonstar specializes in truck-mounted concrete pumps, but it also makes stationary pumps and spider-type concrete distributors. The truck-mounted concrete pumps can reach between 20 and 58 meters [66 to 190 feet].

“Pumps that reach over 50 meters [164 feet] are in a special class,” Alver says. “To manufacture those, we require special engineering and materials, and that is why we need Strenx steel.”

Thanks to the high-strength steel Betonstar has been able to use a special, lighter design for the longer booms, which adds customer-value.

“We have great design-flexibility thanks to Strenx,” he says. “We can change our designs however we want. Thanks to this, for our latest 52-metre pump model, we could switch from 5 foldable booms to 6 foldable booms. It led to a lighter pump, and we decreased the weight all the way from 41 to 39 tons. This is very important for the end user, because we were able to mount the pump on a 12-metre vehicle that does not require a special permit to travel on the roads.”

Betonstar has partnered with SSAB for several years, and since 2016 it has been part of the My Inner Strenx® program. Işıl Köker, purchasing manager at Betonstar, says the My Inner Strenx® sign assures customers that they are buying the best possible product. Köker thinks the traceability IDs are an important part of the quality process.

“With the traceability IDs we can trace all the components of our pumps, which manufacturer they came from, who welded them, and who operated them,” she says. ”The My Inner Strenx label on a second-hand product makes it attractive and gives it a higher resale value, because this label shows that you are buying a reliable product which was manufactured using a reliable production process.”

So, for Köker the My Inner Strenx® program adds extra worth to Betonstar’s brand.

“This is especially important in newer markets we enter,” she says. “We notice that the end users know about the quality of SSAB products, and the label on our concrete pumps actually develops growth and reputation in the market for us.”

The technical cooperation with SSAB is also highly valued by Betonstar. Yıldız cherishes the close collaboration.

“Our My Inner Strenx membership helped us become a preferred company,” he says. “The membership denotes originality and quality to our customers. It makes our customers very happy to see that our products are made of Strenx steel, because they know it means that quality products are used throughout, and that the whole production process was approved by SSAB.”

Alver also appreciates the help the company gets from SSAB, pointing to the importance of the technical support provided during the design process when using Strenx® performance steel.

“For instance, with the help from SSAB we can plan ahead to shape the sheets during production,” he says. “With SSAB's technical support, we can attain the advantages of these sheets with less tests and less waste. SSAB can even do the calculations for us when welding the sheets. The thing that satisfies us the most is the brand assurance of Strenx steel, it’s a reliable and consistent material that means less maintenance and longer service life for the end user.”