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Factory relocation in Southampton and across Hampshire
Factory moves in Southampton come from manufacturers and fabricators on the estates at Nursling and Millbrook. Port and marine businesses along the water and process operators on the Waterside add to it. Each move runs end to end under a single point of contact: survey and asset register, decommissioning with your engineers and the equipment manufacturers, strip-out and dismantling, the machinery lifted clear, packed, crated and hauled, then offloaded, positioned, levelled and set to line for recommissioning.
We cover Southampton, Millbrook, Nursling, Totton, Marchwood, Hythe, Eastleigh, Romsey and Winchester, out to Fareham and Portsmouth. Smaller relocations are priced the same working day from a desktop survey, larger ones after we survey both buildings.
What a factory relocation covers
A relocation can cover a whole works or a single department, run as one turnkey job from survey to handover. What travels can include CNC machine tools, presses, injection moulding machines, packing lines, conveyors, compressors, process tanks, test equipment and racking. Machines you are not keeping go for sale or disposal on the same visits, and if the new building is behind, equipment waits in our storage.
Factory moves we plan in Southampton
| Type of move | What sets the timetable | What we handle |
|---|---|---|
| Moving to a bigger or newer unit | When the new floor, bases and supplies are ready | Measuring both units, lifting out, hauling and setting up to the new layout |
| Bringing two sites onto one | How soon the surviving site can take more plant | A combined register, with arrivals fitted around live production |
| A closure, with usable plant going to a sister site abroad or in the UK | When the sister plant can start it up | Isolation, crates built for the journey, and the surplus cleared |
| Rearranging a factory within the same building or site | Whatever pauses your production plan allows | Machines shifted bay by bay while the floor keeps running |
| A single line or department moving | The stoppage your order book can take | Taken apart, numbered, hauled and put back together on the new line |
| A lease end forcing a move | The handback date on the lease | Everything out by then, with storage for what the new unit cannot house |
Our factory relocation service page runs through each stage.
Contact us
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 Southampton
Relocations around Southampton come from these sectors.
Engineering works at Nursling and Millbrook
Machine shops and fabricators on the estates ringing the city relocate machine tools, presses and racking when a bigger building comes up, each going back on a levelled base squared to your floor marks. See our industrial sector page.
Port and marine businesses
Workshops and marine engineering firms along the Test and the Itchen move handling plant and benches when they change premises, with inductions and vehicle rules on every load. See our maritime sector page.
Process plant on the Waterside
A permit system governs the work here, so pumps, compressors, vessels and skid-mounted plant move inside a booked shutdown. See our chemicals sector page.
Warehousing and packing off the M27
Buildings around Eastleigh, Hedge End and Totton relocate conveyors, sortation and palletising equipment when they take more space. Break points are fixed at survey so each run comes apart cleanly and goes back the same way.
Hospital and university departments
A hospital or university department changing building sends its machinery and laboratory equipment across in a set order. See our healthcare and pharma and education pages.
Access and planning for a factory move in Southampton
Points we check on most Southampton relocations:
- The way round the head of the water. Southampton Water has no road crossing, so plant leaving Hythe, Marchwood or Fawley runs north on the A326 to Totton and the M27. That round trip goes into the loads planned for each day.
- The new building on the programme dates. Bases, power, air, drainage and a clear way in each need a date, confirmed before the first lorry loads.
- Getting each machine out of the old works. Shutter sizes, headroom, yard space and whether cladding can be opened decide how an item comes out, and the method is recorded against it.
- Slabs and yards at both addresses. Skates and jacking gear put weight into a few small contact points, and ground close to the water is made up, so crane standings are checked with the floors inside.
- Road space and oversized items. Where a load-out needs road or footway space, we arrange the traffic management and road closure with Southampton City Council, or Hampshire County Council outside it. Oversized machines go on abnormal load notice.
Keeping production going during the move
Output keeps flowing because the move runs in stages. Whatever your order book can release goes across first and is back in production while the old floor carries on. Big lifts are booked for a weekend or a planned stoppage, and a firm moving from Millbrook to a unit off the M27 can keep both floors going while it happens.
The date you hand the old building back and the date the new one can take machines rarely match. Equipment waits with us in between and comes out as the new floor is ready for it. Surplus machines are cleared for sale or disposal while we are on site.
Postcodes and areas we cover
We cover every SO postcode and the Hampshire districts around the city:
- Southampton: city centre, the docks, Millbrook, Shirley, Freemantle, Bassett, Highfield, Swaythling, Bitterne and Woolston
- The Waterside: Totton, Marchwood, Hythe and Fawley
- Around the city: Nursling, Eastleigh, Chandler’s Ford, Hedge End, Romsey and Winchester
- Wider area: Fareham, Portsmouth, Andover, Salisbury and Bournemouth
We relocate factories right across the UK and into Europe.
Why Southampton firms choose Synergy Lifting for factory relocation
- Work sequenced around your production. The order machines come out is set by what you can release and when the new floor can take them.
- Hampshire moves and moves out of Hampshire. A move to Eastleigh and one to a sister plant in Europe come off the same register and programme.
- No handovers between contractors. Lift, rigging, haulage and reinstallation sit in one agreement, so one date changing moves the programme with it.
- 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
Services that sit alongside a factory move in Southampton:
How a factory relocation works
- Start with both addresses, a rough machine count and your restart date.
- We visit both ends and list every item that is moving. A smaller job is priced from a desktop survey that day.
- Your price and programme follow that order, with method statements, risk assessments and lift plans written to match.
- Our crews take the plant out, pack it and move it in the order the programme sets.
- At the new site each item goes to its marked position, levelled and set to line, then handed over for recommissioning.
Common questions
Our Waterside shutdown window is fixed months ahead. Can a move be built around it?
Yes. The programme is written backwards from that window, with isolations, lifts and load-outs slotted inside it and the rest of the work done either side.
Some plant is going abroad and the rest to a Hampshire unit. Can one move cover both?
Yes. The register marks which items go where, and both streams share one programme. Anything going overseas is crated and case marked to your forwarder’s booking.
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 Southampton
- Phone: 023 8168 4568
- Email: southampton@synergy-lifting.co.uk
Send both addresses, a rough machine count and the date production has to restart, and we will come back with what the move involves.
We also provide factory relocation in Portsmouth, Bournemouth, Reading and Brighton. See all the factory relocation locations.