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Reprinted with permission from
The Courier=Times Online
Many of the Person County workers who have spent years at Eaton Corp.’s Roxboro plant making tire values and other products for Eaton’s Air Controls Division, apparently will be able to continue doing just that, but under a new name and for a new owner.
Eaton announced last December that it intended to phase out its Air Controls Division at the Roxboro facility in order to concentrate on its valve actuation business, which has greater promise. The move, however, appeared to threaten about one-third of the some 500-member workforce at the Eaton plant off the Durham Road.
This week, however, within just a matter of days before Eaton was poised to have the air controls operation go dark, word came that a deal had been struck, and not only did air controls have new life, it also likely would remain in Roxboro, doing what that operation has done best for all these years, only with a few not insignificant changes.
On Wednesday, the China-based Shanghai Baolong Industries Co. Ltd. And Zhongding Group issued a news release announcing that the companies had purchased Eaton’s Air Controls division. The purchase price was not disclosed.
As a result, the newly-acquired business will now operate as Dill Air Controls Products LLC., borrowing on the Dill name that dates to 1909 when Dill Manufacturing Co. was founded in Cleveland, Ohio. Eaton Corp. ultimately acquired Dill in 1961, but it kept the Dill identity to distinguish its air controls line of products.
According to the Baolong and Zhongding release, Dill Air Controls Products will “continue to manufacture components for the tire service markets, pneumatic market and compressible fluid markets” and it will continue to do so at the Eaton plant here until it can secure a new location.
And David Dixon, the former Eaton…. who is now the general manager for the newly-named Dill Air Controls Products, confirmed Friday that it is the company’s intent to find that new location in Person County.
Glen Newsome, executive director of the Person County Economic Development Commission, also told The Courier-Times this week that he is working closely with Dill officials to acquire another facility here.
“We have a good potential location for them,” Newsome said.
Newsome neither identified that location nor speculated when the new site might be available, but he seemed optimistic about the prospect.
In any event, the company expects to be able to complete the relocation by the end of the year at the latest, according to the news release.
Dixon said Friday that he couldn’t yet be certain how many of the Eaton air controls workers actually would wind up with the new business, but he was nonetheless upbeat in that regard.
“We’ve got good people that have been with us a long time [at Eaton], and we plan to keep as many of those good people as our customers will allow us to,” Dixon said.
He said that at the moment between 160 and 170 employees were working in air controls, and he was hopeful that business would be such that the company eventually would be able to count about 150 or more on its payroll.
Dixon conceded that orders could be “a little slow at first,” in large measure because some Eaton customers already had purchased supplies for six month or longer.
But, he said, “This business has been around since 1909. A lot of our customers know Dill more than they know Eaton.
I’m comfortable from the discussions I’ve had [with customers] that they’re very anxious to come back to us.”
Dixon confirmed that four former Eaton managers, including himself, have signed on with the new business. They include Tony Monfredo, who is serving as factory manager; Larry Schlesinger, quality manager and product engineer; and Brian Rigney, sales engineer.
“Obviously there will be more, but those are the four who made the commitment to buy the business,” Dixon said.
The new general manager of Dill Air Controls was highly complimentary of Eaton’s role in the development.
“…Eaton did a great job of not just selling this business to anybody,” Dixon said. “They sold it to what I call strategic partners. The partners have no interest in what I would call chopping up the business or moving the business to China.”
Rather, the new owners, Dixon said, “want us to run the business profitably, and they plan to maintain this relationship for a long period of time.
“I think that’s good for our employees, it’s good for Person County and also speaks favorably of Eaton.”
Shanghai Baolong Industries Co. Ltd. was established in May 1997, and counts itself as a leader in the tire valve business and stainless steel exhaust system businesses worldwide.
Baolong supplies auto manufacturers such as GM, Toyota, Ford and DaimlerChrysler, and also supplies its worldwide aftermarket distributors in more than 50 countries.
Baolong’s main products include: Topseal® tire and wheel service products, Valor® performance exhaust system and components, DigiTire® tire pressure monitoring system. Its main service includes international trade, Dragon-Auto chain shops of auto service.
Zhongding Group was established in 1988. It has six joint ventures with different companies in various countries. It reportedly is the biggest auto rubber products manufacturer in China.
Zhongding has produced components for SGM, SVM, GMNA, Ford and DCX.