Automotive supplier Creative Engineered Polymer Products LLC - the old Carlisle Engineered Products, which was acquired last year by a private equity firm - has purchased two factories in Ohio and South Carolina from Parker Hannifin Corp.
Terms were not disclosed. CEP Products is owned by Akron-based Reserve Group. The acquisition fits with CEP Products' goal of expanding into new product lines that fit with its core area of plastics and rubber automotive components, according to Bruce Fassett, vice president of sales and marketing.
The plant in Vandalia, Ohio, makes flexible automotive boots, such as drive-train boots and constant velocity joints. The factory, which housed Parker Hannifin's thermoplastics division, employs 93 and runs 39 presses - both injection molding machines and equipment to do press blow molding, a process that combines blow molding and injection molding to make bellows and boots.
The other factory, in Bishopville, S.C., injection molds exterior trim parts for all-terrain vehicles and watercraft. Fassett said the South Carolina operation employs 48 and runs 13 injection molding machines, with clamping forces up to 750 tons.
Goshen Rubber opened the Bishopville factory in 1999 to mold custom parts for ATVs. Its largest customer, Honda of America Manufacturing Inc., has a plant in nearby Timmonsville, S.C.
CEP Products announced it bought the two Parker plants Jan. 27. The company is based in Akron and runs a sales and engineering center in Livonia, Mich.
Before buying the Parker operations, CEP Products had nine manufacturing facilities in North America. The company does injection molding in Belleville, Mich.; Crestline, Ohio; West Alexandria, Ohio; Tuscaloosa, Ala.; and in Mexico at Chihuahua and Hermosillo.
CEP Products runs blow molding plants in Canton, Ohio, and Lapeer, Mich.
Carlisle Cos. sold its $200 million automotive unit, Carlisle Engineered Products, to equity firm Reserve Group in August 2005.