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FASTENER HISTORY
2010 FIN – SPS Adds 50 Machinist Jobs in Pennsylvania

Manufacturing may be moving away from Philadelphia but one fastener producer was singled out by PhillyNews.com for expanding – including adding 50 skilled jobs thus far this year and plans to add another.
Reporter Harold Brubaker noted that “SPS Technologies L.L.C., a company rooted in Philadelphia manufacturing’s glory days of the early 20th century, has not just survived, but appears to be thriving under the ownership of Precision Castparts Corp., of Portland, OR.”
SPS produces bolts that hold wings on jet airplanes and other fasteners for Boeing, Airbus, Lockheed Martin and other aerospace SPS has hired 50 skilled machinists thus far in 2010 and plans to add 20 more.
“I’ve got a backlog of parts that I can’t fill,” said Kevin Stein, who heads the Jenkintown SPS fastener division, told PhillyNews.com.
U.S. Department of Commerce manufacturing data shows an increase in aircraft parts orders jumped from December to January.
The SPS Jenkintown division reported sales in the past quarter were down 11% to $331.1 million.
There are now about 1,000 employees, up from 900 when SPS was acquired by Precision Castparts in 2003 for $729 million.
Employees recently voted against an International Association of Machinists union organization effort. Precision Castparts has invested tens of millions of dollars in the Jenkintown plant, which dates to 1920, when Standard Pressed Steel Co., as SPS was then known, moved out of North Philadelphia.
Howard Hallowell founded the company in 1903 after inventing a steel hanger to replace cast-iron ones used to hold overhead shaft drives that powered lathes and looms.
Lean manufacturing techniques have the amount of time it takes a raw chunk of metal to be turned into a finished product by half, Stein said. ©2010/2013 Fastener Industry News.
In FASTENER HISTORY on GlobalFastenerNews.com see also:
2003 FIN – Chronology of the 1st 100 Years of SPS Technologies

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