BLAW-KNOX Asphalt / Pavers / Concrete Equipment For Sale

About Blaw-Knox

Blaw-Knox was a major manufacturer of wheeled and tracked pavers, road wideners, material transfer vehicles (MTVs), and much more. It made several notable asphalt paving advances regarding roadbuilding without sideforms, pneumatic tire and rubber track models, and automatic grade and slope control. Blaw-Knox is currently owned by Volvo CE, which sells several asphalt pavers under the brand.

History

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Blaw-Knox P5170B Asphalt Paver

Blaw-Knox was born July 6, 1917 as a merger of steel fabrication companies founded by Jacob B. Blaw and Luther Knox (along with Irvin F. Lehman) in 1906 and 1909, respectively. The new company was headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where the borough of Hoboken—Blaw Steel’s location—renamed itself Blawnox in 1918. The new company made steel forms for concrete paving, among other things.

In 1929, Blaw-Knox purchased A. W. French & Company, a maker of concrete paving equipment that manufactured the Ord line of concrete finishers. The Ord Finisher rode sideforms on either side of the street. In 1931 Blaw-Knox introduced a version of the self-propelled Ord for asphalt paving. It was the first to be height-adjustable, allowing the forms to be re-used in place as additional layers of asphalt were laid down. The Ord didn’t require removable form strips, and it was designed with compression shoes for compaction.

In 1948, Blaw-Knox acquired the Foote Manufacturing Company, makers of the Adnun self-propelled rider asphalt paver. The Adnun had been one of the first formless pavers on the market when it was introduced in 1932. The Adnun Jr Model 8 used a rotating breaker bar and an oscillating cutter bar to improve compaction, while the overlap of its cutter bar action ensured a thinner joint. The Foote acquisition also brought dry-batch concrete pavers into the fold.

Blaw-Knox acquired APSCo (All-Purpose Spreader Company) in 1954, and with it the first pneumatic rubber-tired asphalt paver finisher, the PF-90. The machine had separate drive and material handling systems, which improved performance and control. Later, Blaw-Knox developed an automated grade and slope system for the PF-90 that yielded smoother and more consistent pavement. APSCo also made road wideners, shoulder spreaders, and trench rollers, broadening Blaw-Knox’s product lineup.

In 1968, WCI (White Consolidated Industries) acquired Blaw-Knox. That same year, the latter introduced the first full-width and 40-foot (12.2-meter)-wide pavers with pneumatic tires. As the steel industry took a downturn, WCI sold Blaw-Knox’s East Chicago casting division in 1986. The Blawnox, Pennsylvania, plant closed in 1991.

In 1994, Clark Equipment Company bought Blaw-Knox, which was manufacturing in Mattoon, Illinois. The following year, Ingersoll-Rand purchased Blaw-Knox to add to its roadbuilding product line, having acquired German paver and compactor manufacturer ABG in 1990.

Blaw-Knox introduced the industry’s first asphalt paver equipped with continuous rubber tracks in 1996. During this era, the company also made MTVs such as the MC30 and MC330.

Ingersoll-Rand shuttered the Blaw-Knox Mattoon plant in 2003, and left the construction equipment industry altogether in 2007 as Volvo CE acquired Blaw-Knox and ABG. In 2010, LeeBoy entered an agreement with Volvo to sell Blaw-Knox-branded wheeled asphalt pavers and road wideners through its new LB Performance Paving Products division.

Overseas Operations & Trivia

In the UK, Blaw-Knox established an importer and agent presence in 1921 that led to a design and manufacturing division at Rochester, Kent, and Watford, Hertfordshire. Blaw-Knox bought local construction equipment maker Cowan Hulbert & Co in 1929 and earthmoving machinery manufacturer Tractor Trader in 1939. Blaw-Knox’s UK division made items such as tractors in the late 1930s and scrapers and excavators in the 1940s and 1950s. The Watford plant closed in 1962, and in 1997, Blaw-Knox closed its Rochester plant as well.

Interestingly, Blaw-Knox became known for making diamond-profile, cantilevered radio towers in 1927, as well as hulls, turrets, and gun shields for M-60 military tanks starting in 1943. In 1919 it acquired the Uni-Form system for making reinforced concrete floors and roofs, and after it bought the Buffalo Foundry and Machine Company in New York state in 1945, Blaw-Knox made equipment for the food industry, chemical plants, and more.

Products

Today, Volvo CE manufactures Blaw-Knox pavers with 18- and 26-foot (5.5- and 7.9-meter) maximum paving widths and high operator visibility. These include the P5170B and P7170B wheeled models and the P4410B, P5110B, and P7110B tracked units. The pavers range from 154 to 235 horsepower (115 to 175 kilowatts).

Features

New Blaw-Knox pavers benefit from Volvo’s CareTrack telematics system with geolocation and fleet management capabilities. CareTrack also supports Volvo’s ActiveCare Direct, a managed machine health monitoring service run from the Volvo Uptime Center in Pennsylvania. The pavers come prewired for Volvo’s Blaw-Kontrol and other brands of automatic grade and slope systems.

Find The Right Blaw-Knox Equipment

PavingEquipment.com provides a broad selection of new and used Blaw-Knox pavers for sale, along with road wideners and MTVs that predate the brand’s acquisition by Volvo. Popular models on the used market include the PF150, PF500, PF5510, RW100, and RW195.