Domestic Vs. Foreign PVF Manufacturers

After reading Joan Adams’ column titled “Domestic Vs. Foreign PVF Manufacturers” (Supply House Times, September 2009, page 14) I must say we at Apollo Valves take great exception to its content on quite a few levels. While the accuracy of her article may be true with most domestic manufacturers, her assumption relative to our company is dead wrong.

Our Apollo ball valve offering represents the best quality, best service, unparalleled customer relations, and second-to-none sensitivity to what our customers expect and demand. We are the only industrial ball valve company in the U.S. that offers domestic, vertically integrated products. We design, build, machine, assemble and test 100% of our products in our three South Carolina plants. We even make our own seats and seals and manufacture our handles in-house. We are extremely proud of our three foundry operations. We have a bronze foundry in Pageland, SC, which pours 81 metal, 85 metal, and lead free (AB1953, California and Vermont compliant, Jan 2010). We also manufacture a complete line of backflow prevention devices, safety relief valves, mixing valves, med-gas, water gauge sets, and   various other valve-related products, in our Pageland operation.

Our Conway, SC, operation possesses the most innovative and automated investment cast operation in the valve market place. We also own and operate an Air-Set manufacturing line, which allows us to pour up to 12 inch, 300#, top entry ball valves, in-house. No one in the domestic valve business can make this claim - but US!! We are in the process of starting up a titanium furnace which will allow us to manufacture titanium valves for specific customer needs. We have over a million square feet of “real” U.S. manufacturing space, under roof!

We would like to invite Joan Adams to visit our world-class manufacturing operations in South Carolina. Our on-time performance is the absolute best in the business! It doesn’t matter if it’s for distribution’s inventory requirements or for a capital project buy, we get material to our customers in a very timely manner.

We strongly suggest that Joan Adams consider “rewriting” her article, using Apollo as a testimonial case. We do not appreciate being “lumped” into a poorly researched, broad domestic reference. We are unique in that we are fully committed to supporting jobs in the U.S.! We wave the “Stars & Stripes” every day. We’re proud to be a true American manufacturing company!

Cal Mosack
Executive vice president
Apollo Valves, a division of Conbraco Industries 
Matthews, NC