Southwest Steel Casting Company

Southwest Steel Casting Company is a custom job shop foundry dedicated to providing a quality product as efficiently and economically as possible. Southwest Steel Casting Company produces castings from 10 to 4,500 lbs.

Located in Longview, Texas, Southwest Steel Casting Company has established itself as a reliable foundry serving the energy, construction, transportation, marine and mining industries.Southwest Steel operates two Nobake foundries with both arc furnace and induction melting. Support equipment for the molding lines includes both attrition and thermal sand reclamation systems. Additional support equipment includes core making facilities, a large casting cleaning room and analysis equipment for both molding sand and castings.Southwest Steel has full heat treating services which allow for diffusion of carbon alloying elements, softening, hardenings, stress-relieving, toughening, improved machinability, increased wear resistance, and removal of hydrogen entrapped at the surface of the casting. Finish machining, assembly and painting are services Southwest Steel provides to its customers on a regular basis.A formal Quality Assurance program, with ISO 9001 certification, insures that the finished product meets the customer’s specifications. Southwest Steel is also certified PED certified (Pressure Equipment Directive of the EU) for the manufacture of pressure equipment. Southwest Steel also has an ASNT Level III inspector and multiple ASNT Level II inspectors.

History

Located in Longview, Texas, Southwest Steel Casting Companywas founded in 1971. In 1974, it was bought-out by Texas Steel, who owned SWS until December 1989. It was purchased by American Car Foundry (ACF), and under whose ownership it remains.At the time of its purchase by ACF, Southwest Steel was shipping approximately 180 tons/month. This number has since been increased to approx. 700 tons/month, and the number of employees has almost doubled from 120 to well over 300 since 1989.
When founded in 1971, Southwest Steel Casting Company consisted of one manufacturing building, Plant 1, and the Administrative offices. Plant 1, at that time, was a green sand casting facility with one arc furnace and a shell core department with modest pattern repair capabilities. Since that time, Plant 1 has been expanded 3 times.The original green sand system has been replaced by a modern NoBake molding system and includes a state-of-the-art sand reclamation system. The core making facilities have been enhanced with the addition of a phenolic urethane coldbox core blower. In addition, amine gassing and scrubber support equipment have also been installed.
In 1976 additional manufacturing facilities where required to meet increasing customer demands. A second manufacturing facility was constructed - Plant 2. Plant 2 was designed, from the beginning, as a NoBake foundry. It housed, when built, an arc furnace, core making, molding loop, pouring area, shakeout, casting cleaning room and shipping facilities.As with Plant 1, Plant 2 has undergone several expansions which include additions to the cleaning room, furnace department and shipping docks. In 1997, the existing attrition reclamation system was moved and expanded into an adjoining building. In 1998 a Gudgeon thermal sand reclamation system was installed to improve the quality of the sand and to reduce Southwest Steel's waste stream.
To support the manufacturing plants, additional facilities have were added in 1997/98. These facilities included a pattern storage building, with a fire suppression system, a services building which houses the testing facilities, stores and maintenance, and a new 6,000 sq. ft. Administrative Offices building. To handle the additional traffic, a new access road and parking lot expansion was completed in 1998.