Hey all you Snow Fighters out there! It’s a beautiful Saturday morning after our routine workout, and my wife and I decided we wanted to take you on a quick tour of our facility. Below we’ll show you some of the reasons why we are a cutting edge snow plow products manufacturer. Since it’s a Saturday, the shop won’t be as busy as it is during the week, but you’ll get to see some of the latest advancements KAGE has made since the turn of the year and not having some of the chaos like you’d see during the week will be good for this little tour.
Snow Plow Rebuild/Rehabilitation Program
The first stop on the tour is the area where I’m performing a research project on taking in old, abused KAGE snow plows and refurbishing them – bringing them back to like-new condition. We’ll keep you updated on this project in the future, but what we can tell you now is that these old plows are not going to be easy to work with right out of the gate. It’s just something we want to work through and determine if it’s a viable program or not. Make sure you stay tuned for updates on this potential snow plow rehab program.
Raw Materials Staging Area for Cutting and Drilling
This is where the whole process of manufacturing a snow plow begins – raw materials. It’s here where all the steel parts get cut to size and drilled. Each cut and drilling is replicated with absolute precision. We strive to build every snow plow in exactly the same manner. If any of the raw materials are cut wrong or the bolt holes for assembly are in the wrong spot, the piece of steel gets scrapped. We’re happy to say that our facility effectively eliminated any possibility of that happening thanks to the jig system we built in-house for this staging area – a real time-saver!
Welding – One of the Most Advanced Areas at KAGE
At our previous facility we typically had three to four welders across two shifts doing all our welding – everything from moldboards to tractor mounts and everything in between. Now, with the larger facility, we have six welders on the job during one shift pumping out parts at a significantly increased rate. The biggest rave in this area is the new ventilation system that we installed to keep the air quality cleaner for all the welders.
Snow Plow Parts Grinding Area
Grinding is the working man’s job and with the increased rate of parts coming out of the welding department, the grinding area also needed some improvements. For instance, we’ve installed a new boom lift so that the grinders don’t have to wait for an available forklift to move parts in and out of their grinding stations. This continues to be an area of improvement since the addition of a new sand blast booth was added.
The NEW Sandblast Booth
This giant 20 ft x 40 ft x 14 ft tall enclosure is perhaps this most advanced piece of equipment on site at the new facility. In the first quarter, we can comfortably say that our efficiency with this new blast booth has increased by more than double compared to our older facility. The biggest benefit to this system is being able to recycle 95% of our blast material to be used multiple times and the operator is working in a much safer environment having a fully contained suit with constant fresh air being sent to him for clean breathing. Words cannot say how much this equipment has upped our game in getting products out to our dealers and customers faster.
Snow Plow Assembly Area
After the parts get blasted, they get sent out to be powder coated at one of our vendor’s locations. When the parts come back from powder coating, they get assembled and prepped for delivery. At this point, an inspection is done on all the plow systems before they’re released for delivery. This crucial check point ensures that you’re getting the best-made snow plow on the planet.
Snow Plow Products Shipping
After assembly, some plows get stored for future delivery and some go out immediately for recent orders. Again, a final inspection takes place before any products are loaded and shipped for delivery.
Well there you have it folks. You just got the quick tour of our new, advanced manufacturing facility. We encourage you to stop by for a tour if you’re ever in the area. We get a lot of customers that are intrigued by the complex process of building our snow plows and we love to talk about it, too.
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