Commercial wheel maker Accuride Corp. has announced plans to invest $75 million in 2012 to strengthen product availability, quality and reliability; upgrade its manufacturing processes; and improve customer service.
The announcement, made at the 2012 Heavy Duty Aftermarket Week Conference, follows a 2011 investment of $35 million to increase aluminum wheel production capacity.
“Accuride is committed to being a reliable and dependable supplier of steel and aluminum wheels and wheel-end components for our OE and aftermarket customers,” said Rick Dauch, Accuride president and CEO of the Evansville, Ind.-based company. “We made solid progress in boosting our production capacity last year, and are stepping up our investments to extend and accelerate that progress throughout 2012. These investment plans further demonstrate our continuing commitment to improve product quality and ensure availability to meet growing demand by our customers and the industry.”
The first phase targets new machining lines and related equipment in the company’s wheels business, and is already underway. A second phase involves improvements at Accuride’s Gunite operations.
Some $20 million of aluminum wheel capacity investments will include facility improvements, the installation of new machining lines and equipment, as well as the transfer of equipment among Accuride’s three aluminum wheel plants in Erie, Pa.; Camden, S.C.; and Monterrey, Mexico. These actions will optimize material flow, standardize wheel machining processes, and achieve greater surface-finish consistency for its aluminum-wheel product lines, the company said. Once completed, Accuride’s 2012 investments will double the company’s aluminum wheel production capacity at its Monterrey and Camden plants.
On the steel wheel side, Accuride will make targeted investments in machining, equipment, facility upgrades and engineering initiatives to further improve product and process quality.
The second phase of Accuride’s capital investment program, to be announced later this quarter, targets the Gunite wheel-end business unit that produces spoke wheels, hubs, rotors, full cast brake drums and automatic slack adjusters. These investments will address the production issues and capacity constraints that Gunite experienced during 2011. The resulting manufacturing improvements will boost Gunite’s capacity and throughput, and improve product quality, according to the company.