Top supplier for underground infrastructure

"If it turns out that standard components cannot be used, we develop a custom-made solution in close consultation," says director Bastiaan van Kaam. "We have been doing this for thirty years now and it makes us unique to this day."

Van Kaam is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year and has had the pleasure of supplying many projects over all these years. According to Bastiaan, this is mainly due to the strong focus on the value added services the family business is known for. "Fast service and large stock are perceived as a big plus by our customers," he says. "We have our own delivery service. For the Randstad region, we apply the adage: order before 3 p.m., is delivered the next day, if in stock, of course. But that's generally not a problem." Even the current crisis in the plastics and rubber market has not affected Van Kaam much. "Our suppliers are mainly in Europe."

Bundle pull head for HDD drilling

Strong in customization is another important spearhead at Van Kaam. "For example, a few years ago we developed a pull head to pull PE pipes through bores very efficiently. From there, we developed the bundle pull head to pull horizontal directional (HDD) bores in one go. We build these weld-on pull heads fully customized to the project and starting from a bundle of three that can vary in diameter. The pipes are interconnected via the weld-on pull-up head, after which the drilling company can fill the pipe with water or bentonite so that the head is weighted. This in turn reduces resistance and friction during the retraction of the bore. Longer lengths can thus be pulled with greater ease. Most recent pulling head we have delivered is a bundle of seven tubes of which 6 x 160 and 1 x 125. Delivery time is generally two to three weeks."

Mirror welding in the field

Another recent investment made by Van Kaam is the purchase of a mobile welding station. "With this we are able to do mirror welding on location up to a diameter of 630 millimeters, of course fully taken care of by our own NEN 7200 certified welders. The mobile welding station is completely self-sufficient and represents an important expansion to be able to do more mirror welding in the field. Incidentally, we have equipment available for mirror welding up to diameters of 1200 millimeters on site. For that, we use other equipment again. And so we always try to respond to market demands in our own way. Fortunately, our customers appreciate that. On to the next thirty years," concludes Bastiaan.