The product: Steam Systems makes steel industrial strainers of any size to go in pipelines for institutions, municipalities and commercial construction. Their strainers are mostly for new construction projects, such as bringing water from a river to a city. In that case, the strainer would go in the water pipeline to clean or strain bits of fish and other particles from the water.
The company was started in 1990. In addition to making industrial strainers, Steam Systems is a manufacturing sales representative of process steam equipment and heat exchangers, as well as does installation and maintenance services of the products they sell. On Sept. 8, the company had just finished an order of strainers to go in a chiller that cools water for an air conditioning system for Ohio State University; and on its backroom floor it had a duplex strainer to go to Saudi Arabia for a water system.
The process: These aren’t your typical sink or swimming pool strainers. These strainers range in size from 2-inches in diameter to 48 inches in diameter and as much as 4 feet wide. The strainers go inside a larger vessel of connected pipes that’s bolted inside a pipeline. The pipe vessel that holds the strainer comes in the shape of Ys, Ts, basket strainers or duplex strainers.
Steam Systems is a custom fabrication house, taking orders for the strainers. It can design the strainer and vessel piece. The local company welds the pipes together and shapes the strainer metal material by hand. After it tests it with high pressure water, the strainers and vessels are painted and shipped. One strainer can typically take six to eight weeks to make.
The products can go in water, natural gas or oil pipelines.
The numbers: Steam Systems has 24 full-time employees in Middletown and other workers contracted in other states for installation and maintenance service work. Last year, it had total sales of about $6 million. This year, the company completed a $220,000 expansion.
For more information, visit Steam Systems online at www.steamsystems.com or visit its fabrication division online at www.ssifabricated.com.
SOURCE: Rick Hall, vice president of Steam Systems
Contact this reporter at (513) 705-2551 or clevingston@coxohio.com.
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