An integral part of the global heat treatment industry are the suppliers who provide the parts which keep furnaces operating, this includes everything from controls to burners, refractory, quench oil, cooling systems and high temperature alloy parts. Alloy includes cast furnace parts such as base trays, fixtures, radiant tubes, pusher heads-it is a long list. Fabricated components include muffles, retorts, baskets-the lines blur as many alloy components can be either “fabricated” or “cast”, today we look at a very substantial alloy fabricater in Germany, W. Pilling Kesselfabrik GmbH & Co. KG Metal processing for hot-dip galvanizing and heat treatment plants – W. Pilling

The firm was founded in 1873 and has 4 locations around the country with the headquarters in Altena, Germany which is the facility “The Monty Heat Treat News” visited this past Thursday. Pilling supplies kettles and crucibles for the hot dip galvanizing industry while also offering fabrications for the die casting, wire and heat treatment industries-our interest as always is focused on the heat treating industry.

What we witnessed was a company with a great deal of expertise in muffles and retorts and the ability to handle very large fabrications. As an example Pilling is very proud of the fact that just a few years ago they supplied a SS retort to a commercial heat treater in Germany who installed what is quite possibly the largest pit carburizing furnace in all of Europe. This furnace (pictured here) can handle parts up to 17’ in diameter X 17” high (5.1 meters) with a weight capacity of 50,000 pounds.

The roughly 150 employees of the company have supplied products around the world, while the focus is on Europe orders from North and South America are not uncommon. This is largely because Pilling’s ability to handle very large parts puts them in a small, select group. During our meeting it became clear that fabrications up to 18’ in diameter X 60’ long (6 meters X 20 meters) would not pose a problem.

At this point we will let these photos tell the rest of the story.

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Daniel Potthoff, W.Pilling, Joern Rohde, Nikolai Prinz, Managing Director, W.Pilling, Gord Montgomery