Factory Relocation Dover

Factory relocation in Dover and across east Kent

Engineering and manufacturing firms at Whitfield and Aycliffe call us when they outgrow a unit or give one up, as do marine businesses along the coast. One point of contact runs the move: survey and asset register, disconnection and decommissioning with your engineers and the equipment manufacturers, strip-out and dismantling, lifting the machinery out, packing and crating, transport, offloading and positioning at the new site, then reinstallation, levelling, setting to line and recommissioning.

We work in Dover, Whitfield, Aycliffe, River and Buckland, along the coast to Deal and Folkestone, and inland to Sandwich, Canterbury, Ashford and Thanet. A smaller move is priced the same working day from a desktop survey.

What a factory relocation covers

A relocation can be a whole works or one department, run as a turnkey job from first survey through to recommissioning. Machines you are leaving behind go for sale or disposal on the same visits, and equipment waits in our storage until the new building is ready.

Factory moves we plan in Dover

Type of move	What sets the timetable	What we handle
Moving to a bigger or newer unit	Handover of the new unit	Both addresses surveyed, the plant lifted out and set back up
Bringing two sites onto one	When the site you keep can free floor	Deliveries ordered around equipment already running, on one register
A closure, with working plant going to a sister site here or abroad	When the receiving plant can take it	Decommissioning, export crating, case marking and clearing what stays
Rearranging a factory within the same building or site	The output you have to keep up	Machines shifted bay by bay and set to line
A single line or department moving	The shutdown production can give it	The line marked up, split with its conveyors and rebuilt
A lease end forcing a move	The day the keys go back	The unit emptied by that date, with storage covering any wait

Our factory relocation service page has more on how these moves run.

Get In Touch

Please leave a few details and a member of our factory relocation team will be in touch to discuss your requirements in more detail.

Where we work in and around Dover

Relocation work around Dover comes from these sectors.

Industrial estates from Whitfield to Canterbury

Machine tools, presses, compressors and racking go across together when an engineering firm changes unit, north of the town or out towards Sandwich and Canterbury. Each is set to line before your engineers reconnect it. See our industrial sector page.

Marine engineering along the coast

Engineering firms beside the water keep lathes, test rigs and handling gear on open ground, and a change of premises takes the lot onto prepared bases at the far end. The heaviest items are booked for settled weather. See our maritime page.

Firms whose work comes off the port

Freight, cargo handling, repair and storage businesses near the port take workshop plant and stores when they change buildings. Security, inductions, vehicle rules and sailing times govern the port side, and the sequence fits them.

Hospitals, schools and public buildings

A department changing building sends its workshop machinery and laboratory equipment across in a set order, ready for the manufacturer to commission. See our healthcare and pharma and education pages.

Utility and rail workshops

Workshops and stores serving substations, water sites and the Kent lines hold machine tools, test rigs and racking, and they move when a building is given up or rebuilt. Those dates are fixed well ahead and the programme is written to them. See our power and renewables and rail pages.

Access and planning for a factory move in Dover

Points we check on most Dover relocations:

Loads timed around the Channel freight. The A20 and A2 carry traffic heading for the port, and a relocation puts a run of lorries on them over several days, each with its route and hour settled first.
The new building, ready before the first load. Floor, machine bases, power, air and a clear way in each carry a date, checked against the receiving site.
Getting the biggest items out. Shutter sizes, headroom, yard space and whether a roof panel comes off decide how each machine leaves, recorded item by item.
Chalk under one yard, made ground under the next. The town runs from chalk at the cliffs to made ground along the front, so slabs and standings are checked at both ends and point loads from skates and jacks spread to suit.
Closing a street, and notice on big loads. Where loading needs road or pavement space we arrange the traffic management and closure with Kent County Council, and notify abnormal loads where needed.

Keeping production going during the move

Few firms can shut a whole works for a move, so it goes in stages. The lines you can spare go first and run at the new site before the rest follows, and a line that can only stop briefly is taken over a weekend or a planned shutdown.

Where the keys go back before the new building can take plant, our storage holds the equipment and each item comes out once its base is ready. Anything you are not keeping is cleared on the same visits for sale or disposal. A firm leaving a cramped town yard for a unit at Whitfield has both ends on one programme.

Postcodes and areas we cover

We cover every CT postcode and the districts around the town:

Dover: town centre, the port area, Whitfield, Aycliffe, River and Buckland
The coast: Deal, Walmer, St Margaret’s, Folkestone and Hythe
North and west: Sandwich, Canterbury, Ramsgate, Margate and Ashford
Wider area: Maidstone, Tonbridge, Tenterden and the rest of Kent

We relocate factories right across the UK and into Europe.

Why Dover firms choose Synergy Lifting for factory relocation

The old works left fit to hand back. Holding-down bolts are cut back, pits and ducts covered and the floor swept once the last machine has gone.
One walk-round with your own people. Before anything is isolated, our supervisor goes through the sequence on the floor with your maintenance and production staff.
The same firm unbolts it and bolts it back down. Crane, rigging crew, transport and reinstallation sit on one contract, with one person answering for the programme.
Qualified and accredited. CPCS and NPORS operators, lifts planned to BS 7121, equipment inspected under LOLER and PUWER, SSIP approved, Constructionline Gold Member, certified to ISO 9001 and ISO 14001, and members of the Construction Plant-hire Association.

More than factory relocation

A Dover relocation can call on other services:

How a factory relocation works

Tell us both addresses, roughly how many machines are involved and the restart date.
We walk both sites and build the asset register, or price a smaller move from a desktop survey.
The quote arrives with a programme in move order, plus method statements, risk assessments and lift plans.
Our crew extracts each item, packs or crates it, and transports it in its planned slot.
At the new address every machine is reinstalled, levelled, set to line and handed over for recommissioning.

Common questions

Our works is in the town and the new unit is at Whitfield. Does a short move run differently?

It changes the shape of it. Plant crosses in batches on consecutive visits, each machine set to line as it lands and the old building emptied on the same run.

Some of our machines are going to a plant in Europe. How do they leave the works?

We take them out of service with your engineers, wrap and case them, then mark and list every case on the register. The cases suit the transport your freight forwarder books, and we load onto the vehicle they send. Shipping is theirs to arrange and the works end is ours.

Can we keep producing while we move?

In most cases, yes, for part of the plant. We move the lines you can spare first and get them running at the new site, then bring the rest across. It means more visits, and it keeps output going while the move is under way. We tell you at survey which parts can overlap.

How are disconnection and recommissioning handled?

We agree who does what at survey and write it into the programme. It is a mix of our crew, your maintenance team and the equipment manufacturers, and everyone knows their part before the first machine moves. Recommissioning is done with your engineers or the manufacturer.

Get a quote for factory relocation in Dover

Phone: 01304 700 758
Email: dover@synergy-lifting.co.uk

Send us both addresses, a rough machine count and the date production has to restart, and we will set out how the move would run.

We also provide factory relocation in Ipswich, Brighton, London and Cambridge. See all the factory relocation locations.