commercial vehicle body builders founded 1959 otley west yorkshire headquarters ripon north yorkshire uk products salt spreaders road menders tippers unibodies hotboxes number of employees 120 website www.econ.uk.com econ engineering limited are a uk manufacturer of winter and road maintenance vehicle bodies originally founded as a supplier of agricultural equipment under the name of agriquipment ltd on december 9 1959 by w. george lupton in otley west yorkshire . 1 the first econ prototype salt spreader was finished in 1970 and the machines were launched at the 1972 iwm exhibition in torquay . 2 the name econ comes from a bradford based company who manufactured industrial heating units called econoheat bought by wg lupton to balance production whilst developing the salt spreaders . constructed in 1980 econ engineering ltd manufacture and service all of their machinery at a custom built site on the outskirts of ripon north yorkshire employing upwards of 120 staff . history edit 1959 agriquipment ltd was founded by wg lupton on 9 december in otley west yorkshire . 1961 patent granted for the world s first flail mower designed by wg lupton . 1965 agriquipment ltd was sold to the oliver rix group and production was moved to ac bamlett in thirsk . 1966 the lupat flail mower goes into production at ac bamlett and continues until 1969 . 1969 wg lupton parts ways with the oliver rix group to found econ engineering ltd based at an old vaux brewery site in ripon . the lupat flail mower was re purchased from oliver rix and production moved to econ in ripon . 1970 the first econ prototype salt spreader was built . 1972 the salt spreaders are launched at the iwm exhibition in torquay . 1975 econ introduce road speed related spreading to discharge salt at the same rate irrespective of travelling speed . 1979 planning was secured for a new purpose built factory on the outskirts of ripon . 1981 econ bought atkin s of clitheroe then the largest uk spreader manufacturer from the cammell laird group . 1 1984 1986 the acquisition and merger of spencer s of market harborough and acklift of southwell saw the creation of a street lighting division the addition of taskers of andover taylors of consett lister farm machinery and l & k sprayers create a burgeoning agricultural division . late 1980s the agricultural and powered access divisions are dismantled and sold off following the 1980s boom and bust . 1991 the hot box highway maintenance equipment is released . 1993 econ qcb system is developed and launched . 1994 unibody multipurpose body and salt spreader is released . econ leaves the agricultural market completely and continues in the highway and winter maintenance sector . 1995 pre wet spreader is released . 1996 the low throw spreader is released for urban spreading . 2003 the econ factory site was expanded to include a large refurbishment centre at the north of the site . 2004 econ installs the most advanced paint facility citation needed in the north of england to increase anti corrosion performance . spargo control system goes into production allowing remote salt spreading adjustment on the move . 2005 the acquisition of mhs s hire fleet doubles the size of the econ fleet to 160 units . 2008 spargo is goes into development an electronics gps control unit that allows sat nav style route directions and preplanned automatically varying salt spreading patterns . the first hedge trimmer built by george lupton founder of lupat later econ engineering econ hedgemaster model hm3e built 1996 and original lupat vergemaster built 1960 econ prototype spreaders at the 1972 iwm exhibition in torquay econ factory ripon n yorkshire 2007 econ salt spreader in use winter 2009 2010 references edit a b the independent 13 november 1996 the independent true grit article econ shows true grit this winter . yorkshire post . 22 october 2013 . retrieved 9 february 2016 . external links edit media related to econ engineering ltd at wikimedia commons econ engineering ltd company website whale econ partnership retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title econ engineering & oldid 704155029 categories agricultural machinery manufacturerscompanies based in north yorkshireriponcompanies established in 1959hidden categories all articles with unsourced statementsarticles with unsourced statements from february 2016commons category with local link same as on wikidata navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version in other projects wikimedia commons languages add links this 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