Pilot’s Final Landing
April 11, 2023
By: Larry Trojak
For decades, trucks have pulled away from the loading docks at the printing operations site of The Virginian-Pilot daily newspaper serving the Hampton Roads area , the of Virginia. A family-owned and operated enterprise with a more than 150-year history, the paper was sold in 2018 to Tribune Publishing, which announced shortly afterward that it would move the Virginia Beach print operation elsewhere.
With plans to develop the site already in the works, NDA member East Coast Demolition was contracted to level the 170,000-square-foot plant — including the 36 massive presses that once printed the former daily. No stranger to larger industrial projects, the North Carolina-based company moved in and, using a range of hydraulic attachments from NPK Construction Equipment (Walton Hills, Ohio), set to turning the final page on the plant.
ECD: The Backstory
Headquartered in Moyock, North Carolina, East Coast Demolition (ECD) was founded in 1981 by Richard Webb II, who started as an abatement specialist, primarily removing asbestos insulation from piping in area shipyards. Because so many of his customers were also beginning to tear down older structures at their sites, Webb decided to capitalize on the situation and enter the demo realm. According to Ricky Webb, the founder’s son and current chief operating officer, his dad, armed with just an excavator and a truck, started growing the business.
“The company’s growth was slow and steady at the outset but really ramped up in the early 2000s, employing as many as 70,” Webb says. “The recession of 2008-2011 took its toll on the business, as it did on everyone, but they downsized and weathered the storm. Coincidentally, that’s also when I returned from college. Though I’d been working in the business since I was very young, at that point I started helping run things in the field, doing the estimating, etc. Since then, I’ve transitioned through many roles, helping build the company to where it is today.”
The 2022 version of ECD is, indeed, a far cry from its modest startup posture. With 35-40 employees, sales in the $7 to $9 million range, and a focus primarily on commercial and government work, the company has become one of the larger players in the Hampton Roads demolition market. To maintain that status, it uses an extensive fleet of 15 excavators as well as shears, processors and other peripheral equipment to tackle a range of heavy industrial demo projects.
“We have a lot of iron by design,” Webb says. “Equipped as we are, we can handle multiple projects — even several large projects — at one time. That’s proven a successful strategy; we generally average anywhere from six to 10 jobs ongoing at a time. And it’s not just the number of attachments we have; it’s the versatility we get out of those tools. That’s been a real key to our success to date.”
Stop the Presses
As mentioned, the newspaper plant project was a sizeable one, calling for the demolition of nearly four acres of heavily reinforced structures, some of them more than 40 feet in height. However, it was the newspaper presses themselves that presented some of the more interesting challenges to ECD’s skills.
“Each of the 36 presses was massive and contained as many as 15 heavy, solid stainless-steel rollers, some of which measured up to 24 inches in diameter,” Webb says. “We used our M28K material processor to first snip the gears holding each roller in place, then crack the cast metal press housing, freeing up each roller. Once free, the rollers were placed aside for removal off-site and eventual torching while the remainder of the press was downsized. In essence, the process was almost surgical in nature, and the M28 was at the heart of it.”
For the more “standard” facets of the demolition, ECD used a combination of a pair of M28K processors teamed up with a new M38K model, which was purchased to process some of the larger structural material — a sizeable volume of 1.25-inch-thick I-beams, for example — encountered on the job. According to Webb, purchasing the new attachment with a “K” jaw set provided them a distinct advantage.
“In our business, one of the most critical, high-wear parts of any shear is the piercing tip,” he says. “When that area is compromised through prolonged use, replacement is necessary. In the past, that has meant removal of the tool from use, a fairly lengthy torching process and the loss of valuable production time. The M38 with this particular jaw set, however, features a bolt-on piercing tip, which can be quickly and easily replaced, minimizing downtime and upping productivity. That, and the tool’s excellent cutting force, have been invaluable out here.”
Quick-Change Artists
In addition to the attachments cited above, ECD is also using a pair of demolition grapples (also from NPK) as well as multiple Rockland Krypto Klaws and a Gryb Hydmag scrap magnet. To maximize usage of all these tools, the company has equipped its excavators with quick couplers from Oil Quick. Doing so, Webb says, has made changeout between processes, once a labor- and time-intensive effort, a snap.
“And it goes further than that,” he says. “There is always temptation on the operator’s part to use the tool mounted on the excavator at that time — even if it’s not the right tool — just for expediency’s sake. Having the ability to do a changeout between a shear and a grapple in about a minute removes that temptation entirely. This is faster, more efficient, prevents damage to the attachments over time and, most importantly, is safer.”
To demo the acres of slabs left after removal of the structures, ECD will use NPK GH10 and GH15 hammers. They will then replace the M28K’s shear jaws with pulverizer jaws and process the concrete to get it sized for the crusher.
That's a Wrap
In addition to the usual nonstop activity taking place, a visit to any of ECD’s job sites will also immediately reveal one thing: The company has some of the most tricked-out excavators at work today. More than simply aesthetic in nature, the wraps that envelop several of ECD’s machines are also very functional, Webb says.
“I’m not denying that we try to be a bit different and stand out from everyone else,” he says. “But the wraps, while being eye-catching and great for brand awareness, also do an excellent job of protecting the excavator’s paint. Most scratches on our machines tend to be very minor and don’t make it through the wrap to the paint. As a result, a bad scratch can be remedied simply by replacing the wrap. And, when it comes time to sell the machine, we just remove the wrap, exposing the paint beneath it that is good as new. So it’s promotion and protection all in one.”
Loyalty Is Rewarded
Webb is quick to mention that any business is only as good as its employees and, in that regard, he feels they have been truly blessed.
“Our crews and office staff are some of the hardest working people in the business,” he says. “Fernando Cifuentes, our head mechanic, has been with us for 17 years, and Carl Stallings, one of our chief operators, has been with ECD for almost 26. Carl is one of the best, and we recently recognized his commitment to the company by assigning him his own machine, a new Volvo EC380E Straight Boom. He is, by nature, an amazing operator, but with the best equipment, he’s untouchable.”
That logic of believing in the intrinsic value of good equipment drives Webb’s purchases as well as his need to stay abreast of new and evolving technology.
“We want our people to have the best because we know it will help them perform their best,” he says. “My dad bought his first NPK shear in 1998 because he wanted a tool that was versatile, reliable and backed by good support. He knew the technology that was unfolding at the time and was intrigued by the use of a multi-jaw tool, so he reached out to an area dealer he was working with at the time. That dealer rented him a Komatsu excavator with an NPK M28K processor, which did all they’d promised and more. He never looked elsewhere after that — and neither have I.”
East Coast Demolition expects to wrap up structural demolition by mid-January 2023, demobilize and then return to tackle two months of foundation/parking lot demo and crushing before turning over the site for development.