Reduction Engineering Inc. (Booth N4993) will introduce the first model in a newly designed line of pelletizers carrying the company's trade name.
``Finally, there is a strand pelletizer suitable for any downstream equipment,'' said Chris Case, the firm's sales manager.
Kent, Ohio-based Reduction Engineering has cantilevered the motor in an opposite direction and cleared out the bottom, ``where people usually put the motor,'' he said. ``We took a 5-foot-tall table and put the pelletizer on top. Now, underneath, you can parallel park a gaylord'' or any pellet classifier.
The new concept incorporates innovations and represents the first identifiable Reduction market entry since the May 1 announcement of Reduction's purchase of the Conair Group Inc. (Booth S2649) line of strand and water-slide pelletizers. Reduction began supplying rotors to Conair in 2001 and started assembling all Conair pelletizers in 2002.
Under the purchase agreement, Reduction Engineering can use the Conair name in connection with pelletizing products for five years, but the display at NPE 2006 will debut the first pelletizer solely identifiable with Reduction Engineering and visibly distinguishable from Conair models.
To boost its capabilities, Reduction has invested more than $1 million over 18 months for two large, computer-controlled multiaxis grinding and machining centers in Kent and a smaller machine for a service center in Oxford, Mass. Previously, outside vendors supplied those services.
``We extended ourselves from a second shift to a third shift, and now we are a 24-hour-a-day shop,'' Case said. ``We are doing more content in-house to reduce costs.''
While making changes, Reduction intends to minimize the number of components differing from those in existing Conair models.
``We are looking to utilize as many wear components from the original Conair design into the new design without compromising it,'' he said. ``We do not want to explain why a user has to get rid of parts on the shelf. We will make those parts better but not redesign them.''
In another market niche, Reduction Engineering maintains a Kent sales office and service center for rotational molding equipment from venture Rotoline Industrial Equipment Ltda. of Santa Catarina, Brazil. Reduction owns 75 percent of Rotoline, and Brazilian entrepreneur Washington DeLuccas owns the remainder.
Robert Sly founded Reduction Engineering in 1993. He continues as company president. The firm has focused on total-system pulverizing and rotational molding systems, and now deals with full-scale compounding requirements from inlet feeding to packaging.