During the mid-1930’s, professional truck driver Angelo Maccagno, born in 1898, grandfatherof the current partners, started transporting Luserna Stone from the stone quarries of Luserna San Giovanni, Rorà and Bagnolo Piemonte down the valley. He carried on the job for about 30 years. Vincenzo,born in 1938, took over the management of the truck firm from Angelo, his father. In 1963 he applied for and received the allocation of the quarry lots number 2, 3 and 4 from the City of Luserna San Giovanni, lots which were neglected at the time. The quarrying started right away after the allocation. The decision of former quarryiers to stop quarrying was mostly due to the particular features of extractable Luserna Stone, characterized by a low fissility, a low attitude to natural splitting. Since its beginnings the quarry production was therefore directed both towards high thickness natural split products like large slabs, sidewalk, floor and wall stones. While the present production is still partly directed towards these products, the main products are now both sawing blocks and cliff blocks. The sawing blocks have different sizes and quality, and can be processed by multiblade granite gangsaws, diamond disks and diamond wires. Over the years the cliff blocks have become the irreplaceable components for the construction of both river protection banks and retaining walls, as an alternative to reinforced concrete structures. The quarrying methods have been slowly but constantly developed by changing over from the combined use of manual air compressed drills and gunpowder to block cutters on rails and detonating cord. In the mid-1980’s the Maccagno quarries were the first in the area to start drilling with hydraulic drills, exploiting both the hydraulic equipment and the frame of tracked excavators. More recently, thanks to the latest remarkable technological improvements, we started quarrying with diamond wire cutting. This method is going to almost completely replace the “mountain” cut, performed up to now with air compressed drilling. Today, thanks to the introduction of expanding mortar and hydraulic rock-breakers, quarrying requires a drastically reduced amount of explosives. This is a remarkable improvement of both product quality and workers and equipments safety.

RENEWABLE ENERGY

Since 2003, our company has been getting involved in the business of renewable energy, with the hydroelectric power station of Barma Scura, located along the quarry access road. The power station taps a water concession from Luserna and Mora creeks, using a 1.650 kW Pelton turbine and a 210 mt. drop. We consider the renewable energy power production a matter of the highest strategic importance as our company is searching for new projects to be realized both directly and in shared capital, in Italy and abroad.