While many American manufacturers have moved production overseas, one south-central Pennsylvania maker of farm equipment is planning to produce more components in-house.
Pequea Machine, based in the Lancaster County town of New Holland, makes all sorts of farm machinery, from cattle feeders to manure spreaders. One category of equipment it sells is rotary rakes, which farmers use to arrange hay into rows after they mow it. Afterward the rows of hay are gathered in bales.
Right now the gear boxes that help power these rotary rakes are manufactured in Europe, with a few being made in China. But changes in the world currency market, along with challenges in the process of getting enough gear boxes to New Holland, prompted Pequea to start making the gear boxes in its own plant, using local suppliers.
“We'll be able to produce this at a similar cost and have better quality,” says Pequea's general manager, Ryan Skibo. Plus, he adds that the company will no longer need to have huge loads of gear boxes on hand and can instead make smaller quantities as needed.
Pequea has come up with a model of how it would like its gear box to be configured, although it's essentially the same design that's used now. Engineers at Lehigh University will assist with the designing process, and the Ben Franklin Technology Partners of Central and Northern Pennsylvania are loaning $25,000 toward the project.
Skibo estimates that Pequea will start producing the gear boxes at some point in early 2012.
Source: Ryan Skibo, Pequea Machine
Writer: Rebecca VanderMeulen