Anyone who spends time biking in and around Cape Cod, Mass., is probably pretty familiar with the work of Lawrence-Lynch Corp., Falmouth, Mass.
As one of the largest family-owned site development, utility and paving companies on the Cape, Lawrence-Lynch has paved miles of bike paths not only throughout Cape Cod, but also on Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket Island. Most recently, Lawrence-Lynch completed a 5-mi. extension to the Shining Sea Bike Path from Rt. 151 to Woods Hole, a project that wasn’t due for completion until June 2010, but which was officially opened on July 4, 2009.
In addition to paving bike paths, Lawrence-Lynch has been involved in site work with National Grid and NSTAR and boasts an extensive list of products and services, including hot mix asphalt, sand and gravel, paving and construction of roads, driveways and parking lots, general contracting, underground utilities and heavy equipment rentals. Recently, Lawrence-Lynch was awarded both a $3 million contract at Chatham Municipal Airport and a contract at Martha’s Vineyard Airport, Vineyard Haven, Mass.
The company originated when Jerry and Stephen Lynch, fourth-generation contractors, purchased the Frederick V. Lawrence Company. A few years later, Jerry purchased his brother’s shares and became the sole owner and most recently, Christopher Lynch, Jerry’s son, purchased the construction division from his father.
The company’s 24-acre headquarters includes office space and equipment repair shops and employs more than 100 people and has 142 pieces of equipment.
Lawrence-Lynch Materials Corp., one of the company affiliates, which is now owned and operated by Jerry Lynch, has its asphalt plant and its sand and gravel processing facility on the Falmouth site and employs 10 people. White Brothers – Lynch Corp., Oak Bluffs, Mass., is a site contracting business and a manufacturer and installer of bituminous concrete with 10 employees under Jerry Lynch’s leadership. And in April 2007, Christopher Lynch purchased Okeechobee Asphalt and Ready Mixed Concrete Inc., Okeechobee, Fla.
With such a wide variety of companies and services to offer, Lawrence-Lynch Corp. has come to rely on Woods CRW Corp. of NH, Hooksett, N.H., to handle many of its equipment needs, including the recent purchase of a Vögele Vision 5200-2 paver from Mark Chartrand, sales representative.
Chartrand and Woods CRW Corp. of NH’s President, Jeff Lothrop, invited Kurt Pimentel, equipment superintendent, and Joe Oliveira, general foreman of labor forces, both of Lawrence-Lynch, to travel to Nashville, Tenn., with them to tour the Wirtgen facility and training center. When they returned, Pimentel decided to demo the Vögele paver for a week, which turned into two and after putting 85 hours on it, they decided to buy it.
Pimentel said they purchased the paver because of “the functions that it offered. It has built-in automation, slope and grade controls, and an automatic greasing system, which means that it auto greases the 12 most important bearings in the machine, which normally would have to be done manually every day. This saves time on maintenance and extends the longevity of the machine.
“Visibility is great,” Pimentel continued. “The machine has unobstructed views. Operator platforms swing out so you can look out from the sides of the machine. When running automation, you can monitor what the other screwman is doing without walking back and forth, because it has a built-in system.”
The built-in monitoring system, ErgoPlus, is made for Vögele pavers to monitor the other men on the crew, the temperature, the yield counter, diagnostics center, encompassing the operator platform, operator control desk and the screwman’s lateral console on the screed.
“The built-in diagnostic center goes through and does an internal check in the system to make sure everything is running okay every time you turn the key. There is also a built-in yield count, which tells you how many feet you have paved against tonnage used,” Pimentel said.
Pimentel has been with the Lawrence-Lynch Corp. since 1986 and has been doing business with Woods CRW Corp. of NH for 15 years. He said, “The service has been great. They offer a one-year warranty with the paver. They have also offered to sit down with the parts book and go through it with us to determine what we might need so they can have it in stock for us.”
Oliveira, too, is impressed with the Vögele 5200-2, calling it “one of the most intelligent machines I’ve ever used. I like the auto-control, auto-grade and slope control.”
As the general foreman of labor forces at Lawrence-Lynch, Oliveira runs three full-time paving crews and three foremen. He’s been with the company for 15 years.
The paver already has more than 200 hours on it and has been used on a number of projects including the Shining Sea Bike Path, Rt. 134 in Dennis, Mass., a federal highway job in Provincetown, Mass., a number of projects in Chatham, Mass., and, currently, the paver is on a job in Osterville, Mass.
CEG
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