year, and the downturn has made the company take a close look at its expenses and remove unnecessary costs from its operations, Muller said. “We can operate at a lower volume
now and be profitable,” Muller said. “During the years you’re doing a lot of volume and making money, you don’t always look at costs as carefully as you should. If there is a silver lining to this four to five year slump, it has made us a better company and we have made a lot of process improvements that have come from the shop floor.” Te one area of the company that
has outperformed all others is the cast iron division. Muller said it has been profitable every year, in part because of the commercial castings side of the business. A percentage of Charlotte Pipe’s casting product mix is now devoted to commercial work, mostly for the power transmission, motor, air conditioning and refrigeration, mate- rial handling and servicing industries. Selz expects that number to increase in the next several years, with an effort to open new end-use markets pushing sales further. To help it achieve that growth,
the company has instituted a number of continuous improvement initia- tives, such as a 5S program that has improved its safety performance. “For our senior management, a
significant portion of their annual bonus is based on safety,” Muller said. “[Our safety record is] far better than the industry average. We take great pride in that. It’s not just a produc- tivity issue. It makes sense to take care of your people, and it’s the right thing to do.”
More Capital for Casting Muller said Charlotte Pipe makes
capital investments even during lean years, including setting aside the money necessary to buy the two new automated casting lines and the electromagnetic coating system. “We would like to be a high volume
shop on the commercial side, and we will invest in the equipment to do that,” Muller said. Te two new automated mold-
ing machines will replace Charlotte Pipe’s existing 1996-model machines,
The pipe manufacturer uses automatic cupola controls to maintain the appropriate carbon equiva- lents when pouring pipe, fittings or commercial castings.
increasing capacity for high produc- tion castings up to 35 lbs. Te “e” coating unit is expected to improve the aesthetics of the fittings more so than parts coated in the traditional manner. “It’s a protective coating, and can be used as a base coating for powder or wet painting,” Selz said. “Te neat thing about the process is you are cleaning the part and creating a zinc phosphate surface on the part allowing for flexibility in final coating. It is environmentally friendly and more durable than the cur- rent product.” Te investments in the metalcast-
ing facility reflect Dowd’s assertion that Charlotte Pipe “loves the foundry business.” Even with the growth of
plastic pipe, he said there will always be a market for high quality castings. “We think that [the demand] is
out there,” Dowd said. “Te domestic consumer wants an alternative to [foreign castings]. We think we can play in that sandbox. We have high hopes for that business. Te fact that people are saying ‘hey, this Chinese stuff ain’t what it is cracked up to be,’ that is a bonus.”
ONLINE RESOURCE Visit
www.moderncasting.com
for an audiocast with Charlotte Pipe executives.
December 2011 MODERN CASTING | 25
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