ETTL Engineers
& Consultants Inc.
A Brief History of the Company
ETTL Celebrated Its 40th Year of Service in 2005;
Which Means It Is Now in Its Fifth Decade of Service!

Incorporated as East Texas Testing Laboratory in July of 1965, ETTL opened shop in the fall of that year. Its very first contract was a construction materials testing project with the Brookshire Grocery organization. ETTL's home office was then on Tyler's South Loop 323, with soil lab facilities not far away on Troup Highway. In the years since its founding, ETTL's staff has grown to some 60 employees and, as our many clients know, we now have branch office-labs in Longview, Texas, and Texarkana, Arkansas.
Doug Flatt was the firm's first president. He moved ETTL to its present headquarters location on East Erwin in 1969. Doug now serves as chairman of the board; his son, Darrell Flatt, became ETTL's president in 1993. Both are graduates of Texas A&M. Doug took B.S. and M.S. degrees in civil engineering in the mid-50's, as well as a B.S. in agricultural engineering; and Darrell took a B.B.A. in finance/ accounting and an M.S. in land economics/real estate in the mid-80's. They make an ideal team!

Above: Taking a slump test in the 70's, when we were known as East Texas Testing Laboratory . Below: Doug Flatt stands by some soil testing units from our early years. At left front, a volumeter that used a balloon in determining density of in-place soils. At right front, a chain balance used to obtain weights of small soil samples for moisture determinations. At rear, an early computer used by ETTL's staff, one of two IBM prototypes (the other is in the Smithsonian).
Five of our staff are registered professional engineers, three are professional geologists, and three are degreed engineers. ETTL also has degreed and certified environmental specialists, a team of highly experienced engineering technicians, licensed drillers - and one of the largest fleets of mobile drilling units in the region for both geotechnical and environmental projects. Our name was changed to ETTL Engineers & Consultants Inc. in 1993 to make it clear that our many services not only are available throughout Texas, but in Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Mississippi, and other states as well.

 

ETTL's First Years: Especially Providing
Geotechnical and CMT Services
In the 15 years before the founding of ETTL in 1965, Doug Flatt not only majored in civil engineering, developing a background in the geotechnical and construction materials engineering disciplines, but he served as an instructor in civil engineering at Texas A&M until 1957, when he joined TxDOT for eight years, rising to become senior resident engineer in the Tyler District. During those years he was especially involved in development and construction of some 80 miles of Interstate 20. So when ETTL was founded in 1965, Doug was well equipped to lead his new firm in providing its clients geotechnical and construction materials testing (CMT) services.
ETTL soon acquired requisite laboratory and field testing equipment for determining properties of soils, concrete, metallic connections and other key variables.
 In short order it was carrying out CMT services to ensure specifications were being met for an ever increasing variety of structures undergoing construction, including residential, commercial and industrial buildings, as well as roads, highways, parking facilities, bridges, airports, dams and landfills, among many others.
At the same time, ETTL began to build its fleet of drilling rigs, used especially in the firm's early years for geotechnical services. Subsurface findings, including data from samples analyzed in the company's laboratories, provided information for foundation recommendations prepared by ETTL engineers for client architects. (Please note that the above links will take you to detailed summaries of ETTL's CMT and geotechnical services.)

Left: An ARDCO Buggy was used in previous years by ETTL especially for drilling in difficult locations. Now ETTL's steadily expanding fleet uses (at right) remotely controlled Diedrich track rigs (the fleet has two of them) which can go practically anywhere (and do!) ... plus a variety of other drilling rigs ... and many service vehicles.

 
Over the Years: An Expanding Diversity
of Engineering and Testing Services

Since its inception in 1965, ETTL has continued to grow, confirming its reputation in countless projects as a major provider, over a wide region, of geotechnical and construction materials engineering services .

In addition, over the years, ETTL has made many other engineering, testing and consulting services available to its clients. A brief summary of them follows, each linked to detailed information on the specific service.

"Our goal is not only to maintain our reputation as a top regional provider of geotechnical and construction materials engineering and testing services, but to have a like record with numerous other disciplines we have added to our inventory during the past quarter century, including a wide variety of key environmental services."
Darrell Flatt
President of ETTL
Services for Landfills
In the 70's, ETTL began providing geotechnical and hydrogeological studies for landfills. It now carries out a greatly expanded variety of services for them, including CQA services (shown above) during liner installation (well over 20 million sq ft thus far); permitting activities; gas management services; monitoring construction of leachate collection systems and ponds; and many other related services. 		Environmental Services
Some 20 years ago, ETTL set up a staff of specialists to carry out a wide variety of environmental projects. It has completed literally thoudands of site assessments (ESAs), including many Phase II and III activities; can carry out almost all forms of remediation (see above photo); and provides waste management and regulatory compliance services, asbestos identification, and numerous other such services.		 Contract Soil Lab Services
For a number of years, ETTL has been making its soil laboratory capabilities available not only for our own geotechnical and construction materials engineering and testing projects, but also on a contract basis to a wide variety of clients. We believe our laboratory staffs and modern equipment for carrying out soils/aggregates testing are second to none in North Texas (see typical equipment above).
Plus a wide range of other Services, including ... Contract Drilling - making ETTL's rigs and experienced crews available to clients for use in environmental and/or geotechnical drilling ... Pavement Design Services ... Services for Towers (Cellular, TV & Transmission) ... Soil Resistivity Testing ... Forensic Investigations & Expert Witness Services ... Construction Materials Formulation ... Check our Home Page, our Handy Index
... and look through this Web Site. We have many more Services at your disposal!

 

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