PRESSEARTIKEL

Pioneer with endless rotation in England

Murrhardt-Fornsbach, 02.04.2025

 

In autumn 2023, Porteous Groundworks Ltd. from Plymouth was the first British company to buy a RotoTop from importer MPS Southwest Ltd. They had such a positive experience that they invested in further rotary drives from Swabian manufacturer Holp shortly afterwards.

 

In recent years, Holp GmbH has expanded its sales network of dealers and importers to more and more countries. In the summer of 2023, the company also began working with British construction machinery dealers. It started with one responsible sales partner each for England / Wales, Scotland and Ireland. The first RotoTop in the UK went just a little later to an impressive young construction company in Plymouth, Porteous Groundworks Ltd.

 

Founder Ben Porteous from Plymouth, England, grew up in the world of building sites and construction machinery, mainly because his father had a construction company that Ben worked for as long as he could remember and where he also gained his first professional experience. The company ceased operations during the 2008/2009 crisis, so Ben Porteous worked for other companies and was eventually promoted to construction manager. After a serious illness, he decided to completely reorganise his life and start something of his own. In early 2022, at the age of 31, Porteous, together with his siblings and other family members, launched the construction company Porteous Groundworks Ltd., achieving sales in the tens of millions in its second year and employing 40 people.

 

Simple, effective and much cheaper

Ben Porteous has also shown himself to be a pioneer who is open to innovation when it comes to his investments: when purchasing a new Hidromek excavator HMK230LC-5, Porteous had it fitted with a RotoTop RT.251 by MPS Southwest; it was the first to be used in the UK. He explained that he had been looking for a cheap, simple alternative to the standard tilt rotators for a long time in order to avoid the associated disadvantages. During the site visit he explained: ‘In my opinion, these are far too complicated, including installation in the excavators and the control system, the extra plumbing and altering flows, etc.,’ he said. Then there are the costs, which bring tears to your eyes, and the fact that you also have to buy other buckets if you want to make a real profit."

 

Advice from Jason McCullough, Managing Director of MPS Southwest, convinced him of the benefits of the RotoTop, particularly the cost/benefit ratio. Ben Porteous explains shortly after the purchase: "With the RotoTop from Holp I can do 90% of what a tilt rotator can do on site, but at half the cost.

What's more, the rotary drive is compact and lightweight and easy to integrate into the machine and control system. We can use all existing buckets and other attachments and make them endlessly rotatable. And if the whole thing doesn't work, it can be dismantled again in a short time, as it works out with the excavator's existing cables."

 

The latter was never going to happen and the RotoTop RT.251 is doing its job reliably, ensuring greater productivity on the construction sites of the up-and-coming company. The fact that Ben Porteous ordered the RotoTop RT.022 for a compact excavator just two months later shows that the RotoTop concept was a winner. A short time later, it was the turn of the larger excavators again with two RotoTop RT.092 and an RT.201. At the moment, further enquiries are already being processed, according to Jason McCullough from MPS Southwest.