September 19, 2025
The Situation
Ashridge Contractors ltd were contacted by a construction firm to develop a new home build site in Falstaff, Sheffield. Ashridge Contractors site foreman, Kane Hudson is experienced in groundworks and has worked on many projects during his career however, Yorkshire Water required large scale deep drainage solutions to be installed on the Falstaff site. This led Kane to seek the advice of experts to meet the strict manhole base standards set by the water company.
The Challenge
The manholes to be constructed on-site were technically challenging owing to the required depth and pipe connections that had to be made. Ashridge Contractors knew that traditional manhole base construction methods wouldn’t work for this job.
Kane had been introduced to the concept of Vertfrom® on previous sites. As he hadn’t used this inverted manhole base construction method before he was unsure of its capabilities.
A meeting was arranged with Ashridge Contractors, Ant Hire Solutions and Yorkshire Water to review the technical drawings and discuss the exact requirements that had to be met for the manholes to meet inspection standards.
How Ant Hire Solutions Helped
Tony Cannings, Field Customer Service Executive at Ant Hire Solutions, supported Ashridge Contractors ltd with the review of the technical manhole drawings and hire of a Vertform® set, whilst also providing on-site demonstrations and training of best practice Vertfrom® installation.
The construction site at Falstaff required a bespoke Vertform® set to be used, comprising components from different ranges/sizes of the Vertform® system.
Successfully constructing the deep drainage solutions required expertise in interpreting technical drawings and understanding the numerous applications where Vertform® can be used to great effect. By combining Ant hire Solutions’ equipment and dedicated team, with Ashridge Contractors skilled workforce, all the manholes constructed on the Falstaff site were completed to Yorkshire Water standards.
Kane Hudson was deeply impressed with the work carried out and stated:
“Tony kept in touch with me on-site to make sure everything was going well. He was always a phone call away when assistance was needed. He arrived on-site as scheduled with the materials and even though we were not quite ready for him to install, he was more than understanding, moving his work schedule to come back the following day. The three contractors we have installing the drainage could not say enough good words about how helpful Tony was and therefore I think he has more than deserved me passing a good word on to your team at Ant Hire Solutions.”
Designed and developed by Ant Hire Solutions, Vertform® is a totally unique system that allows manhole inverts to be constructed quickly, safely and easily by unskilled teams.
Vertform® is proven to produce exceptional results. For every project, our team review your construction plans to make sure the Vertform® system is specified to the exact requirements of the project, ensuring you get a durable, high-quality finish in the shortest possible timeframe.