“ When we came out with the next generation


of mounts, we made the castings thinner because we had more expertise about the weight loads —Joe Dolack


quality inspection, defect rework, du- ties, barriers to international shipping (Mexico, for example, applies a 20% duty to parts made in China), freight, and additional offi ce personnel to man- age the outsourced inventory, purchase orders and accounting. “China is inexpensive, but the


logistics add cost,” Potts said. “Every- thing has to be managed logistically. Then there are the quality issues. When an issue arises here, you over- see the entire process.” In particular, Peerless early on dis-


covered that the quality of the fasten- ers it received from Asia was below par. Those components are critical in holding the company’s mounts to the wall or other stationary objects. When Peerless tried to fi nd a new supplier of the fasteners, the change was diffi cult due to the span of distance, culture and language. “Any change takes a long time,”


Eble said. Because of its position in the pro-


fessional market, Peerless has also spurned low cost countries because of their propensity to knock off products, a problem that is rampant for its retail- focused competitors. “You have a better ability to pro-


tect your intellectual property when you manufacture the parts in-house,” Potts said.


Launching the Program It was when Peerless fi rst had the


inkling it could produce the parts it was buying from Asia economically in-house that Dolack got the phone call he supposed was a prank. The fi rst step, the company decid-


ed, was to bring in a consultant with diecasting experience to determine for sure the idea was a fi nancially sound one.


JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2011


After examining each of its aluminum die castings individually, Peerless determined it could produce them economically on two 600-ton diecasting machines.


METAL CASTING DESIGN AND PURCHASING 23 ”


Dolack became that consultant. “First thing, I reviewed all the cast-


ings to determine cycle times and processes,” he said. “We looked at all


the prints, and there were similar cast- ings that I was able to compare and analyze to fi gure out how we would build them.”


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60