2023 a year of growth, restructuring in hose, belting

The hose and belting market has been characterized by major projects, multi-million dollar acquisitions and a restructuring of one of the world's leaders in the belting space.

Mexico has taken center stage in the North American belting market, as both Continental and Dayco, among other hose and belting firms, have set up manufacturing facilities there in the last year.

Mexico has free trade agreements with North America via the U.S. Mexico-Canada Agreement; South America via MERCOSUR; and Europe and Asia.

And like so many other industries, the hose and belt space has not been immune to the pandemic overbuying and post-pandemic destocking.

Freight costs continue their volatility, and thus a refocusing on proximity to customers continues for those in this major rubber products market.

Here are six stories that stood out in the hose and belting markets in the last year.

To say that Belt Power L.L.C., a distributor and fabricator of belting and belting components, has been aggressive with its acquisitions might be an understatement.

Small- and mid-sized firms in lightweight belting products are finding a new home under the auspices of Belt Power, as the Marietta, Ga., company has purchased three firms in the last year alone.

On the heels of its Oct. 30 acquisition of Blankenship Belting in the Pacific Northwest, Belt Power purchased Reliable Rubber Inc. of Romeoville, Ill., just outside Chicago, in November.

Terms of the acquisitions were not disclosed.

Like the Lakewood, Wash.-based Blankenship purchase, Reliable Rubber increases Belt Power's footprint in a specific geographic area, in this case: the Midwest.

The second-generation belting and component firm has been in business for more than 45 years and specializes in the distribution and fabrication of conveyor belting, hose, industrial rubber and urethane products. The company provides its lightweight belting products and services to customers across the Midwest.

Conversely, Reliable Rubber will leverage Belt Power's expanding footprint, fabrication capabilities and technical sales organization.

In addition to Reliable Rubber and Blankenship Belting, Belt Power in recent years has acquired Dunham Rubber and Belting Corp.; Accurate Industrial Products L.L.C. of Imperial, Mo., a fabricator and distributor of lightweight belting components; Engineered Components Inc. of Ormond Beach, Fla., a distributor of material handling parts; Rubber Services Corp. of Denver, a distributor and fabricator of conveyor belts; and Regional Supply L.L.C. of Marietta, Ga.

And there are no plans for Belt Power to change its purchasing position, as the company told Rubber News last year that it plans to open new locations in the coming years in Springdale, Ark., and Memphis.

Ram Enterprise, of Elko, Nev., is on track to install more than 80 miles of conveyor belting on the Atlas Energy Solutions' Dune Express Project.

It is the largest conveyor the company has installed in its 32-year history.

Ram Enterprise provides specialized industrial services, and manufactures and distributes products to the bulk material handling industry.

The company will begin installing 84 miles of conveyor belt for Atlas Energy Solutions' Dune Express project in early 2024. The project is estimated at around $400 million.

The Dune Express will convey sand overland from the Atlas Energy Solutions sand mine in Kermit, Texas, to the northern Delaware Basin in New Mexico. It is estimated to be operational at the end of 2024.

Elevated 25 feet, the conveyor will cross over at least three or four major highways. The materials will travel at 900 feet per minute initially, to be increased to 1,100 feet per minute.

It will reduce the miles driven by frack sand delivery trucks, reducing carbon emissions and saving lives by reducing traffic accidents, which had become almost routine.

The Dune Express will cover 42 miles in four single conveyor flights (more than 80 miles total). One flight will set a new world record of 16.4 miles without a mid-drive.

Ram will use six different splicing and flaking yards to splice the Continental Steel Cord belt into continuous lengths of up to 52,000 feet (9.8 miles).

The project is one of the largest Continental Conveying Solutions conveyor belt orders in Continental's history.

After the realignment of Continental A.G.'s ContiTech business became official in April, implications of the restructuring began to take shape for industrial customers by the NAHAD Conference in July.

Rather than being set up along product lines—such as core offerings of industrial and hydraulic hose, conveyor belting, power transmission belts and air springs—that side of ContiTech now is restructured to focus on three geographic regions.

In practice, that means ContiTech is aligned to ensure its leaders focus on making this entire range of industrial products successful in each of the following regions: Industrial Solutions Americas, Industrial Solutions EMEA and Industrial Solutions APAC.

Along with this remake of ContiTech's industrial businesses, ContiTech consolidated its automotive activities into an Original Equipment Solutions business area, which will operate globally to follow its customer structure.

And the Surface Solutions unit—the final piece of ContiTech—will retain its current structure, with the automotive interior segment serving suppliers to the automotive industry, and LivTec focusing on private customers.

The new ContiTech blueprint comes about a year-and-a-half after the larger Continental underwent a remake of its own. That aligned Conti under three main segments: Automotive Technologies (further split into five business areas), Continental Tire and ContiTech.

Previously, ContiTech and tires had been grouped together in one rubber segment.

In the world of Continental and its $42 billion in 2022 sales, the ContiTech business may seem small. But in the non-tire sector, its more than $7 billion in revenues last year and 40,000 employees loom large, trailing only Freudenberg Group in the most recent ranking of Rubber News' World Top 50 Non-Tire Rubber Products Manufacturers.

Polyhose India Pvt. Ltd. has come a long way from humble beginnings.

Its staff numbered just seven when Y.J. Shabbir started the firm in 1996 in Chennai, India.

It made thermoplastic hose with just one extruder and two braiding machines, and posted modest first-year sales of $130,000, according to Ali Asger, Shabbir's nephew, who joined six months after the founding and now is a Polyhose director.

Fast forward 27 years, and the hose and accessories manufacturer—living up to its "Flexible Solutions Globally" tagline—has a global presence with operations in nine countries, 3,500 employees and annual sales of about $220 million, with exports to 75 countries, accounting for about 60 percent of revenue.

Its five fluid conveyance factories are all in Chennai, with the original thermoplastic plant now augmented by facilities that produce rubber hydraulic hose, couplings, stainless steel hose and hose accessories.

Overall, its business is split between mobile on-road, which is where much of its thermoplastic hose and nylon tubing is used, and mobile off-road, where rubber hydraulic hose and fittings are the main products.

Rubber accounts for about half of overall sales.

Of its export business, North America accounts for about 35 percent, Europe another 30 percent, and the balance is among the world's other regions.

Polyhose's presence in North America started small, in 2002, with a paint spray hose supplied to one OEM, and has grown from there.

Polyhose showed its further commitment to North America when it invested $8 million several years ago to build a 52,000-sq.-ft. distribution and assembly center in Wilmington, N.C., replacing a 10,000-sq.-ft. center in New Jersey.

ROSEVILLE, Mich.—The North American belting market is seeing near- and on-shoring with its manufacturing. As a result, Mexico's belting market is booming as the geographic center of it all.

In response to this continental demand, Dayco L.L.C. has constructed an $11.4 million, 73,800-sq.-ft. production facility from the ground up in a major industrial park in San Luis Potosi for its poly-v belts.

The facility, with an expected production capacity of about 4.1 million belts per year in 2024, is complete and set to begin production in the first quarter of 2024, according to Dayco officials.

Dayco expects capacity to increase each year in San Luis Potosi's Parque Tres Naciones, a well-known industrial park in the city in central Mexico.

Dayco announced in late 2022 this "significant" multi-million dollar investment in a new belts facility.

Production is estimated to start in January 2024 with serpentine (poly-v) belts primarily for aftermarket customers in the U.S., Mexico and Canada. Poly-v belts typically find application in light and heavy duty original equipment.

The company also specializes in timing belts, pulleys and idlers, drive tensioners, dampers, friction wheels and decouplers for both the light and heavy duty conveyance markets.

Dayco, with annual net sales of about $990 million, employs more than 3,600 people at 40 locations in 22 countries. The firm said its ability to transfer power quietly and efficiently has helped it become a solutions provider for hybrid electric vehicles.

When Denmark's Danfoss Co. bought the hydraulics business from Eaton Corp. in August 2021, one of the key parts of the deal was bringing in the fluid conveyance business.

It brought a host of iconic brands in the hose and fittings industry, and was something Danfoss officials knew they couldn't build from scratch.

What the Eaton fluid conveyance unit also brought was a wealth of talent to help continue to lead the business going forward.

And one of those, Andrew Smulski, was tapped in April to serve as president of the DPS Fluid Conveyance Division, a unit that brings in roughly $1.35 billion in annual sales, has more than 5,000 employees and 30-plus manufacturing locations around the globe.

Smulski had spent 19 years with Eaton, much of that in fluid power and distribution sales. For the 20 months after Danfoss bought the business, he served as senior vice president of global distribution sales for Danfoss Power Solutions.

The familiarity with the business was key to making Smulski the right fit for his new role.

"We were looking for a leader who could provide knowledge of not only the customer base, but also had knowledge of the industry, the markets that we played in, the business and the operations," Smulski told Rubber News.

"... I have a great team behind me, and a great team that works beside me to help fill the gaps. I'm really a customer first leader. I told the team, I'm more of a servant leader. I let people do what they're experts at."