20 years of cooperation between the company Benny Andersen and Leica Geosystems has built a solid customer-supplier relationship

Author: Lea Kristoffersen
Video specialists: Pamela Almeida and Line Elmelund

Construction company Benny Andersen uses a big variety of products from Leica Geosystems to ensure quality results. 20 years of cooperation has built a solid customer-supplier relationship based on trust and personal relations.

Benny Andersen specializes in projects related to construction, sewage, and nature restoration. The company has a yearly turnover of 5 to 6 million EUR and undertakes 8 to 10 large projects as well as smaller projects like, for example, rehabilitation of lakes. Benny Andersen has cooperated with Leica Geosystems for more than 20 years and owns a portfolio of products including 2D and 3D machine control solutions for excavators, dozers, hand-operated iCG60 smart antennas, so-called rovers, for stake-out, rotating lasers, and pipe lasers. They have also rented a total station for a sewage project where the GNSS signal was limited.

Preparing for project start

A project typically starts with data preparation. The contractor delivers all project files to Benny Andersen in the form of dxf or dwg files. The files are sent to the external surveying company that Benny Andersen works with. The surveying company prepares the files and sends them out to the machines through the web-based tool for sharing and visualisation, Leica ConX.

The municipality of Esbjerg is the contractor for one of the projects that Benny Andersen is working on. It is a park project project in an area that has formerly been used for train repair. The challenge was that the topsoil was polluted, and the site should be depolluted and repurposed with hills, walking paths, and wildflowers.

- We were invited to a meeting with the contractor before the project started,” explains Thomas Dam, who works as project manager for Benny Andersen. “We were consulted, and we recommended using 3D machine control for a project like this.

For a complex project like this with many details such as hills and walking paths, 3D machine control is very suitable because the 3D solution shows a pre-defined design model that contains all information mapped with the absolute geographical locations for the guidance of the machine operator. The surveying company prepared the 3D files, and there were three revisions during the project. These were synchronized with the machines through ConX. Benny Andersen has used several excavators on the project. One of the advantages is that the 3D model can be used for all machine control solutions regardless of the machine being used.

– Mikkel works as a machine control operator on the CAT excavator. He has worked for the company for twenty years, ten years with 2D and 3D since 2017.

Seamless integration and upgrade paths are some of the advantages of working with Leica Geosystems as a total supplier

Benny Andersen is also authorized to perform sewage and drainage projects. Benny Andersen has worked on a road renovation project the city centre of Esbjerg. For this project, they used two hand-operated iCG60 smart antennas, pipe lasers, 2D machine control, and a rented total station for stake-out in between buildings where the GNSS signal was poor.
 For this road renovation project, 2D machine control is the right choice.

The advantage of the Leica Geosystems license structure is that they build on each other. For excavator solutions, this means that the customer always has the 2D configuration available when they buy the 3D configuration.

For some projects, 2D machine control is not only enough, but it can be a more efficient solution. This is true for this road renovation project where machine control is used to grade the bottom of the sewerage and to ensure the correct slopes. The smart antenna is used for stake-out and to measure the depth and slopes as well as the depths of the pipes and the height of the property boundaries.

Carsten Jørgensen is using the iCG6o for stake-out and the measuring of slopes, covers, and boundaries between the street and the houses.

- We often use the products together, explains Thomas. We can use the same files for the excavator and for the rover.

For the park project, the contaminated soil was marked with an orange plastic net.

This work was made by some hand men, and the excavator was placed in the other side of the site. You just turn on the rover and mark the location of the net instead of having to move the machine from the farthest corner of the site,” Thomas continues.

The Foreman solution

Benny Andersen has worked on another project for the municipality. The project was an area in front of a local train station. The projects included site preparation for benches, bushes, bike parking, water posts, and curbs.

- The Foreman solution was a tremendous big help because all details for the project are marked on the design file, explains Thomas. If we needed to prepare for a lamp posts wire, we could just place a peg, measure it, and remove the peg again, so that we don’t have 300 pegs everywhere. We start the rover and do the stake-out.

Using products from Leica Geosystems for as-built documentation

The cross-function between the products also comes into use for as-built documentation.

- We use the rover for as-built measurements to the contractors. They use it for their GIS registration. It is so easy to bring the rover to measure along a curb or a sand cushion. Before, we had to wait for the surveyor to come to the site for the measuring.

After 20 years of cooperation, Benny Andersen and Leica Geosystems have developed a solid customer-supplier relationship that benefits from personal relations, continuity, and product knowledge.

- We only use products from Leica Geosystems. It is nice to work with people that we know, Thomas concludes.