Bringing it all in-house

In the summer of 2021, Aeroex purchased a Strippit P-1525 punch press from Elliott Matsuura Canada, and the machine has been punching ever since. With the investment, the shop has been able to cut lead times from four weeks to just one week. Images: Aeroex

Mist collection systems have been in machine shops for quite some time. However, today’s machine tools are cutting faster and on harder materials, and mist collectors need to be adapted to work in these conditions.

This is where Aeroex comes in. The Barrie, Ont., company has been in the mist collector manufacturing business for 25 years.

“Manufacturing mist collectors being really the foundation of our business,” said Erik Goglidze, vice-president of sales, Aeroex. “However, in the last three to four years, we've also branched out into some commercial sectors as well as provided some engineered solutions projects.”

Part of the reason for branching out was the pandemic. As a manufacturer of air purification equipment, particularly using medical-grade HEPA filters, the company was approached by businesses in the dental industry to modify existing systems and develop portable HEPA equipment. From there, this segment of the business grew to include installations in hospitals, restaurants, and a number of classrooms across Ontario.

“We really started to grow outside of the metalworking industry, but we have always maintained our core competency in this sector,” said Goglidze. “There are a few different categories out there in the market, many with household names, some with older technology. We’ve maintained a competitive advantage by updating our technology to meet the needs of today’s machine shops, providing depth-loading fibre bed media filtration mist collection technology that is manufactured in North America.”

Aeroex also works with machine tool builders and distributors to engineer and develop machine-specific mounting devices, meaning that when customers purchase a mist collector with their machine, there is no complicated installation process. Instead, the company identified mounting area clearance bolt patterns and fabricates the mounting accessories based on the data.

While these initiatives were taking place, the company realized that it no longer made sense to outsource its fabrication work. So five years ago, general manager Markus Kompp made the decision to invest in an on-site fab and welding shop.

“Today, we have about 7,000 sq. ft. of space dedicated to fabricating,” he said. “It’s all grown very quickly these last few years. We were originally outsourcing all of our fabricating work, but we realized that if we wanted to better support our customers and reduce lead times, we would need to manufacture everything in-house. So that’s when I started looking at buying equipment.”

Finding the Right Investments

Kompp initially started by developing a welding shop and then moved on to building the fabrication department. He found that many of the shops he was outsourcing to often had bottlenecks and increasing wait times. Beyond that, he noticed quality problems with parts not fitting properly.

“I started off purchasing a press brake, and that very quickly turned into needing a machine to cut metal,” said Kompp. “I looked between a laser and a turret, and I found that based on our needs the turret was just more efficient. We manufacture everything out of coated steel—either satin coated or galvanized. And we've had problems where outsourced parts come back warped, or the shop didn’t use enough nitrogen to cut, causing the coating to bubble. So it was really a no-brainer to invest in the equipment to do it right.”

Today, the shop has about 7,000 sq. ft. of space dedicated to fabricating, which has grown very quickly in a few short years. Recently, the shop also invested in an AMADA 140-ton press brake, and next up on the wish list is a laser.

Kompp spent a great deal of time calculating cost per cut between a laser and a turret machine. There were some parts that were incomparably better using the turret, where it was almost a quarter of the cost to punch the part out than to use a laser. Run time was also a factor along with finding a machine with a small footprint.

In the summer of 2021, Aeroex purchased a Strippit P-1525 punch press from Elliott Matsuura Canada. Kompp noted that he understood the supply chain challenges that often went with pandemic equipment investment, but he found working with LVD was easy and it took only a week for the machine to be operational after it was delivered.

“The machine has been punching ever since,” he said. “And one of the biggest advantages we’ve seen is our ability to cut lead times from four weeks to one week. We are able to adjust our workflow as needed, we can put a sheet on it, punch out whatever parts are needed. Before, we were calling on our suppliers and begging them to cut out parts faster.”

Because of this flexibility, the company has adjusted and arranged production relative to project requirements and ditched the first come, first served model it had previously worked with. Having the control to see stock, anticipate run-time, and move projects around to fit customer needs has been a huge gain for the shop.

“We have also experienced the benefits of a turret’s versatility, like being able to dimple and louver,” said Kompp. “There is a huge catalogue of tools available, and while we are still innovating and adjusting product lines, it is something we would like to explore more. The problem right now is that our machine, since we installed it, has been running constantly, so there hasn’t really been time to stop and experiment with what could potentially work better for us. I'm hoping once we add more equipment that will free up the machine a bit to really let us explore new tooling. It’s a fantastic machine in that sense.”

Beyond the turret punch press, Aeroex recently invested in an AMADA 140-ton press brake, an Accurpress 75-ton press brake, and next up on the wish list is a laser. Currently, the manufacturer employs 10 people on the fabrication side, 10 people on the finishing and assembly side, and another 15 people in the office.

Plans to Expand

In the last five years, the shop has outgrown some of its space restrictions. Next door to the dedicated manufacturing facility is another 5,000 sq. ft. of overflow space, and more recently, the company added a 16,000-sq.-ft. space for final assembly and warehousing.

“We have strong plans to continue to grow,” said Kompp. “We expanded and grew very quickly in the last few years and now we are at a point where we need to expand again. Just in six months, we have already outgrown the third manufacturing facility we recently added. Every time we add more equipment, we end up needing more space. And we are constantly finding ways to improve with new equipment, so that has been a challenge.”

The company’s long-term goal is to open another consolidated facility just north of its current location. While this plan will not take place for several years, it demonstrates the company’s commitment to the local community and mist collector industry.

Projects and Partnerships

One of the main reasons for bringing its manufacturing operations in-house was to enable the shop to address customer concerns with immediacy.

Aeroex has been in the mist collector manufacturing business for 25 years, but only recently has it brought all its manufacturing in-house.

“When customers call us, it usually means that they can’t run their operations,” said Goglidze. “We work with our engineering and manufacturing teams to find an answer to their issue. But we are also working with companies on new projects to solve unique challenges.”

For example, Aeroex recently worked with an engineering company to supply a mist collection component for a large soil remediation project in the Bahamas.

“There were a lot of factors involved with this project that we hadn’t necessarily worked with before,” said Goglidze. “The system needed to have significantly higher airflow and pressure, and the size of the system was much larger than we were used to. It also had to be salt and corrosion resistant and hurricane proof. These are just a few of the specifications that made this project unique to work on and has allowed us to expand into the soil remediation industry.”

And while the company has worked on projects in several new sectors, it is constantly finding ways to improve and update its mist collector technology for the metalworking sector. For example, machining for the aerospace industry has moved into more carbon fibre components.

“This material brings toxic fumes to the manufacturing process,” said Goglidze. “We’ve adjusted our products to include activated carbon filtration to take care of these fumes and any missed particulates that would be present during the process. This new product line is something we rolled out as a result of industry changes.”

The company is focused on developing partnerships and collaborating with local suppliers. For example, Aeroex is currently working with many large machine tool distributors in Canada, like Elliott Matsuura, Ferro Technique, and EMEC, as a local supplier for mist collection systems.

“One of our advantages is that we are located in Canada and we don’t heavily rely on global supply chains,” said Goglidze. “Because we manufacture in-house, we can supply accessories with low lead times. And because of this, we continue to expand our reach, which has forced us to grow in order to keep up with the demand.”

Both Goglidze and Kompp expressed that real estate is their number one concern going forward, and there are plans in the works to deal with that challenge. However, labour shortages have also affected how the company operates in the community. Aeroex has partnered with College Boreal and Georgian College to bring in co-op students and develop talent locally.

“It’s important for us to support our community,” said Goglidze. “We want to provide good opportunities for people looking for a new career. And we want to showcase our talents and innovation. Our customer base is growing, our product lines are growing, and we think we have found the best way forward by growing our manufacturing department with new equipment investments to fill our production needs.”

Associate Editor Lindsay Luminoso can be reached at lluminoso@canadianfabweld.com.

Aeroex, aeroex.com

The shop works with machine tool builders and distributors to engineer and develop machine-specific mounting devices, meaning that when customers purchase a mist collector with their machine, there is no complicated installation process.