_________________________________________________________________________________________ Aluminum Blanking
▼ Laura Anderson, President and CEO
to lead the family firm in 2015. Her younger brother Scott Hole is ABCO’ s Chief Engineer, following their father’ s footsteps as pressroom equipment and tooling expert.“ What makes our work exciting, and really drives the whole team, are challenges we are able to solve.”
The company’ s toll-processing model still defines operations.“ We don’ t own the material we process,” Laura says.“ We’ re the caretakers.” Everything that touches the material is designed for surface-sensitive materials, and the business is organized around protecting the material, preserving its value, and creating opportunities for customers through the services and capabilities it offers.
Protection begins with handling, but preservation is where science comes in. Exposed automotive panels, such as doors and hoods, must be pristine, yet the heattreated 6000 series aluminum used can arrive from the mill with flatness issues. For this reason, ABCO has implemented an innovative new leveler on its automotive line.“ Almost every coil can be different because the alloy is ageing and hardening in ways that can vary from coil to coil,” Laura elaborates. The stakes are considerable for ABCO, as material that cannot be used as prime typically loses around $ 1.50 per pound of value, and returning it to the mill for remelting means five to eight weeks of lead time on top of
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