Proving Our Metal

Thanks to both its sand as well as its powerhouse manufacturing workforce, Wisconsin today maintains the fifth-most foundries of any U.S. state, 新北部地区是世界上最大的铁铸造公司——威尼斯注册送38元的所在地，也是该行业最知名的品牌之一, Neenah Foundry.

自19世纪中期以来，威斯康辛州寒武纪和奥陶系砂岩的优势一直是一个雇佣了近20人的金属工业,000.

“It’s called Wisconsin White,” says Waupaca Foundry President, COO, and CEO Mike Nikolai, 如今，该公司在其强大的投资组合中包括砂矿，还包括遍布美国的六家铸铁厂.S. “It’s used in fracking, but it’s also the main reason the foundry industry is a benchmark in Wisconsin.”

Thanks to both its sand as well as its powerhouse manufacturing workforce, Wisconsin today maintains the fifth-most foundries of any U.S. state, 新北部地区是世界上最大的铁铸造公司——威尼斯注册送38元的所在地，也是该行业最知名的品牌之一, Neenah Foundry.

But like any manufacturing sector, overseas competition has historically threatened U.S. foundries. 1933年的《威尼斯注册送38元》和1982年的《威尼斯注册送38元》——后者适用于公路和铁路运输——旨在支持该行业, 最近，特朗普和拜登政府征收了关税和采购令, respectively, to further buoy U.S. iron and steel amid geopolitical tensions, increasing competition and even product dumping by other countries — particularly China.

“You also have the [U.S.] Department of Transportation, the EPA, and USDA, all with regulations related to American iron and steel. They’re all basically the same regulation but written into specific codes,” says Neenah Foundry’s Joe Falle, 谁估计他的公司70%以上的业务都用于公共基础设施. “Without those programs, I don’t know that any American foundry would be in business.”

Heavy competition

Neenah铸造厂是帮助创建市政铸造协会的实体之一, a lobbying consortium of U.S. 这些制造商致力于确保美国制造的金属产品的质量和保护. Falle, who serves as director of research, development, and application engineering for Neenah Foundry’s infrastructure group, says his firm, which among other products makes cast iron manhole covers, street grates, and bridge drainage products, began seeing an influx of competition from India in the 1980s.

2007年《威尼斯注册送38元》曝光了印度铸造厂不安全的工作条件, New York-based utility Con Edison stopped buying manhole covers from the country. But, Falle says, “India still sells quite a large amount of castings in the United States, though in general those are only sold on projects that don’t require ‘buy American.’”
 

Waupaca Foundry also considers federal mandates critical to its success. Decades ago, Nikolai says, 该铸造厂见证了汽车后市场制动转子行业将其灰铸铁零件100%转移到中国. 包括2018年232条款关税在内的联邦行动帮助将企业带回了美国.S. “It is critically important that we continue to produce these parts here in the U.S.,” Nikolai says.

Jay Woldt, associate professor of supply chain management at the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh, is helping to train the next generation of problem solvers in this area. He says demand from domestic manufacturers for graduates of the program is through the roof; he gets at least one email “every single day looking for a supply chain grad.”

An expert on manufacturing reshoring, Woldt says that while U.S. manufacturing suffered broadly from the Asian offshoring boom of the 1980s and ’90s, there are reasons to rethink offshoring today. Metals, in some respects, are low-hanging fruit for reshoring.

“There have been several geopolitical issues, taxes, tariffs, 以及像COVID这样的供应链中断，使公司陷入难以规划的境地,” Woldt says. “But then there’s also shipping. If you talk about products that take up a large cubic volume of cargo space, just think of the weight and volume metals take up.”

Indeed, Nikolai says port delays and container prices that recently climbed as high as $20,000 have been motivating factors for Waupaca Foundry’s domestic customers.

“The good thing for castings, it’s hard to ship them long distances because they’re heavy,” Nikolai says. “So we do benefit from that localization, especially when you see the global transportation system break down.”

Forging partnerships

From his office in Kiel, Amerequip销售和工程副总裁Tim Dorn在谈到本地代工产品时谈到了他的经验.

Shortly after landing at the custom equipment manufacturing firm 12 years ago, 多恩开始与Amerequip的供应链经理合作，计划从北美采购尽可能多的铸件. Waupaca Foundry’s Marinette facility has proven to be a trusted partner in that effort.

“Marinette is an hour and a half away from us,” Dorn says. “To have such a critical supplier that close to us to be able to collaborate is gold. It makes a world of difference.”

Yes, Dorn says — of course, price matters to his customers, 但目前的全球供应链危机已经转移了OEM市场的优先事项.

“It’s become the great equalizer,” he says. “Now delivery trumps pricing. If it’s manufactured in the United States it costs more, but now you’re going to save on transportation time; you’re going to be much more nimble to get the product in time. I mean, 它消除了一些所有人都认为制造业已经转移到中国的优势. It’s a different world now.”

But Amerequip’s commitment to creative, domestic solutions predates the pandemic. Because of his materials science and metallurgy background, Dorn has pushed the company to seize on the trend of converting weldments to cast iron, which saves time and money by reducing the need to weld individual parts in production. 通过与威斯康辛州东北部的铸造厂合作，该公司赢得了最近四次美国铸造协会“年度铸造”奖中的两次.
 

In 2019, Amerequip与Neenah Foundry合作，为John Deere紧凑型多功能拖拉机反铲附件设计了一个摆动框架，将11块钢焊接件简化为一个球墨铸铁件. Then, in May, 它再次获得了与威尼斯注册送38元合作的荣誉，创新的12英寸斗附件-也是迪尔紧凑型多功能拖拉机.

“我们面临的主要挑战是斗齿——世界上大部分的供应都来自中国, and the supply was dwindling,” Dorn says, adding that there were entities that bought up the supply.

因此，Amerequip与Waupaca铸造厂合作，创造了世界上第一个铸铁桶——美国铸造协会评价这一创新为“将激励他人的转变”.” Dorn says a patent application is in the works.

“Our livelihood is cutting steel and forming it and assembling it, 但随着我们继续发展，我们开始消耗产能，现在这已经成为我们发展的一个限制因素,” Dorn says. “That’s where conversion becomes much more important.”

A malleable industry

转换只是美国铸造行业走向未来的方式之一, according to Sara Timm, Waupaca Foundry’s director of marketing and media. Timm表示，Waupaca Foundry不仅投资于转换解决方案，而且还专注于轻量化计划, additive manufacturing, and value analysis and value engineering, or VALVE — “which is taking waste out of the supply chain stream,” she says.

尼古拉说，他很自豪沃帕卡是第一家提交可持续发展报告的铸造厂，其最大的环保举措之一是回收沙子——威尼斯注册送38元回收了800多颗沙子,000 tons of sand annually. Bryant Esch, the foundry’s director of environmental engineering, says a single grain of sand at Waupaca Foundry is reused 40-50 times. Then, “用过的”沙子从垃圾填埋场转移到建筑和农业用途.

他表示:“我认为，在过去20年里，我们在显著改善工作场所方面做了很多工作. “Are we through? No. We still have a long way to go, but we’ve been able to overcome that, and I think when people walk through our facilities they are surprised.”

Automation is not an easy solution to labor shortages in the industry, either. 因为像威尼斯注册送38元这样为汽车工业做大量工作的工厂有超过5个,000 part numbers, the capital investment required for automation doesn’t pay off.

“We are investing particularly in flexible automation with CNC grinders,” Nikolai says. “The main reason for that isn’t a cost-saving, 但由于劳动力可用性问题，它确实使运营商的环境得到了很大改善.”

Steeling for the future

New challenges lurk around every corner, and, as Woldt notes, “iron and steel is a very cyclical product, subject to the booms and busts of the construction industry.” But Falle and Nikolai share optimism for the industry’s future.

“Demand is up,” Falle says. “With COVID, of course, you saw a little dip, and projects were pushed out, 但我们被贴上了重要产业的标签，他们不可能让我们关门. You have to fix roads and we’re seeing a lot more projects; it’s been good.”

“The future of iron castings in the U.S. is strong,” Nikolai says. “所有领先的全球制造公司都在接受在本地采购产品和服务. 他们使用中西部和威斯康辛州的供应商，因为我们有高素质的劳动力，而且地理位置接近对他们的运营至关重要的商品和服务.”