After supporting Australian bricklayers for 51 years, we are now excited to launch in the US and Canada to support bricklayers like we have down under for decades and decades.
Read below to understand how listening to the needs of brickies built BT Engineering from the ground up…
In the period after World War Two bricklayers and pavers in Australia did not have sophisticated equipment. Today it is a different story, and this is the BT Engineering (BT) story.
BT is a family engineering business that was founded by Bruce Thomas in Engadine, a suburb of Sydney, in 1967. Following discussions with a friend in the bricklaying industry, Bruce Thomas was asked whether he could manufacture a tool that would ‘rake out’ brick joints. The tool manufactured at the time was somewhat primitive – a block of wood with a nail hammered into it. This was the start of BT’s ‘steel wheel rakers’ and in later times the ‘poly wheel’ and the well accepted ‘long handle raker’.
After an apprenticeship with the Australian airline Qantas, Jeff Thomas joined his father in 1980 and in 1990 Bruce Thomas’s daughter, Vicki Haynes, joined the company in an operational capacity.
With a mind attuned and the precision required to invent and develop tools to improve the lot of bricklayers Bruce and Jeff established themselves as leaders in quality Australian made bricklaying tools. Along with the talented staff of BT, of whom many have been with the company for over fifteen years, BT has been able to produce tools that have met the needs of tradesmen whose quality is well known in the market place.
Customers have also had a part to play in the success of the company. BT has listened to the needs of customers in developing tools that not only save time but achieve a positive result. A good example is the ‘dori block’ which was designed by a bricklayer called Dorian. The prototype was worked on by BT with the result being a tool that has been well accepted in the market place.
In addition to the tools that are manufactured, BT is the market leader in brick saws, paver saws and block saws. The products are manufactured in the BT factory at Kirrawee with Australian steel and local labour, an aspect of manufacturing that is not often seen in Australia today.
After decades of continuous improvement and innovation, BT now stands as the world’s pre-eminent manufacturer of bricklaying and masonry equipment and is proud to support the tradesman that build homes, communities and countries one brick at a time.
BT is excited to begin distributing its world class products across the US and Canada. Interested distribution partners should contact the Managing Director Simon Plummer via the details below or the “Contact Us” page.