The scale house forms the heartbeat of every quarry. It’s a continuous rhythm that delivers the Dolese experience as customers check in and check out, as employees clock in and clock out.

A new scale house currently under development at our Richards Spur Quarry will strengthen that heartbeat—with benefits for both our employees and customers.

Innovative Construction; An Improved Environment

We selected Midtown Construction Services to build the scale house with insulated concrete forms (ICF), a relatively new Dolese product offering. The airtight, energy-efficient ICF construction helps keep the interior warm in winter and cool in summer and provides a barrier against quarry noise and dust—offering a more comfortable environment for our employees who work there.

It also features larger windows to let in natural light and a climate-controlled data room for electronics equipment.

“Our current scale house is close to 70 years old and no longer sustainable,” said Clint Harris, operations manager at Richards Spur. “Our primary focus in constructing the new scale house was the health, well-being and comfort of our employees. We’ll also benefit from lower energy bills.”

Built with Dolese Products

Like the Dolese Support Services Center, most of the products and structural elements used in the construction of the scale house are Dolese products—and many are directly from Richards Spur! These include:

• Stone, chips and sand from Richards Spur
• Concrete from the mobile batch plant at Richards Spur
• Natural sand from Dover Sand Plant
• Logix ICFs, Arbuckle silver bricks and rebar from our Block Plant

“There’s pride in knowing that the place you work is made from the products you provide your customers every day,” Clint said.

A Better Location

The new location for the scale house delivers greater convenience and safety for both scale clerks and customers. The sliding windows make it easy for scale clerks to take payment without customers having to enter the building.

“For safety reasons, we encourage customers to stay in their trucks at all times while in the quarry,” Clint said. “Having a convenient payment window reinforces this guiding principle.”

“The design team angled the two north corner walls to give scale clerks a better line of sight while trucks are parked on the scales,” he added.

The scale house’s new check-in and check-out lanes and readers also support a more efficient, streamlined process for trucks entering and leaving the plant.

A Team Effort

Breaking ground in February with a projected completion date in late May, the project was a team effort between different departments in Dolese. Shout outs to:

• Engineering
• Accounting
• HSE
• Contracts & Administration
• IT
• Procurement
• Block Plant
• Concrete Products Division
• Quality Control

“Doing a project in-house, with our own people, makes the project go better. Things just happen naturally,” Clint said.

The Move

The move will require all hands on deck to switch over utilities and the complex technology systems necessary to operate the plant. During the transition, the goal is uninterrupted service as much as possible.