A Leader in Technology Old and strong companies like Star Equipment don’t get that way by standing pat. They evolve as the industry evolves, particularly in the 21st century. Technological evolution today forces change and adaptation at head-spinning speeds, but Star Equipment isn’t dizzied by it at all.
tion without the use of string lines, and to control the elevation of the paver so the concrete coming out is to grade,” said Star’s GPS specialist, Charlie Bowman. Anyone at all conversant with computers understands why employing the space-based navigation system instead of mile after mile of stringlines and stakes is a big time- and money-saver. Days and manpower are required to meticulously stake out a stretch of ground to be paved. Then, once the stringline is tautly strung, it immediately becomes vulnerable to being knocked out of alignment by a clumsy workman or an unobservant truck driver.
The company that introduced sewer laser construction systems to Iowa and tinkers with GPS systems like an expert self-taught shadetree mechanic is too forward-looking to be caught pushing yesterday’s technology. What it sees ahead is a world of increasingly exacting construction tolerances and refinements in construction machinery that take the breath away.
The tried-and-true stringline system is increasingly unacceptable in 2013 to busy contractors and demanding project engineers. The better way is using a GPS paving system. It constantly receives input that squares a desired elevation with what a paver is positioned to deliver and adjusts the paver accordingly through Topcon’s Lazer Zone technology. The adjustments are in increments of one millimeter, by the way, or about a .030 of an inch. That’s exacting—and there is no fiddling with stringlines to achieve it.
So Star was more than happy to be part of a makeover project that advanced the technology of construction. An Iowa City contractor, Streb Construction, wanted to upgrade its 1999 CMI slipform concrete paver by retrofitting it with a global positioning system rather than buy a new one with integrated GPS features. Working with hydraulics and paver engineering companies, Star helped turn the old machine into a modern one by adding a Topcon millimeter GPS system.
Streb incorporated in 1965 and serves eastern Iowa. The company purchased its first slipform paver in 1990 and had evaluated the Topcon GPS system for a while before buying it through Star’s Cedar
“The two major benefits of the Topcon system are its ability to control the concrete paver to steer accurately and in the desired direc-
Streb Construction added a GSI, Gomaco Smoothness Indicator, to the retrofitted machine. The GSI is a non-contact surface smoothness instrument that uses three different sensors, two sonic and one slope, to read the smoothness data and display it on a real-time, touch-screen graphic display.
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