A Sinter-esting Story About Winsted
Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Mariah Carey, Richard Gere and George W. Bush share a common link that none of them likely realizes: Their front doors stay locked at night because of a company based in Winsted.
That company is Sterling Sintered Technologies, a privately held, 55-person manufacturer of powdered metal products. Lock parts, like the kind used in the locks sold to the celebrities mentioned above, are only one of the interesting products that this company makes.
Many other items made at Sterling Sinter end up in the products that many people use on a daily basis. Metal parts made in the factory are used to add weight to lipstick tubes, for instance, or to build gas heaters that are used in fireplaces. Some of their parts are also used in firearms to make sights and triggers.
The process of sintering metal is something like putting a cake into an oven — except that you pound the cake into form with 80,000 pounds of pressure and cook it at 2,100 degrees in an atmosphere of hydrogen. One of the benefits of manufacturing in that manner is that it makes very little waste of raw materials: Where a machinist works by stripping away chunks of metal, sintering works by fusing the material. For that reason, sintered metal products are very economical in some applications.
That same process is used to make all of the parts Sterling manufactures. Although sintering is by no means an uncommon method for manufacturing metal products, Sterling has become known for its willingness and ability to apply the process to a broad range of products.
“It’s really our niche,” said Joe Fazioli, a company spokesman.
Metal Doughnut
Speaking of metal baked goods, there’s another Winsted company that makes a great metal doughnut. Of course, it’s not something one would want to eat.
That company is American Collars and Couplings, which specializes in manufacturing devices known as shaft collars.
Shaft collars, explained Vice President Michael Clarke, are doughnut-shaped devices that fit on metal rods and are used to hold something in place — be it bearings or other parts.
They are used primarily in the motion control industry, particularly in manufacturing devices that are mostly found in machine shops. They’re also used, for instance, in drills and drill presses that are sold to consumers.
In most cases, since they’re sold through industrial distributors such as Kaman in Bloomfield, one would never realize he has a product made by American Collars and Couplings.
But there are still some common items that over the years have been produced using American Collars-made devices, particularly when it comes to cars and their care.
Many overhead garage doors, for instance, have included shaft collars made in Winsted.
And many race car drivers use shaft collars made by American Collars and Couplings. Clarke said that was thanks to some racers who frequent Lime Rock Park in Lakeville. One day they began using the devices to adjust the way their suspensions work on different tracks.
Clarke, whose family bought the business in 1988, said that he even has one customer in Florida who uses shaft collars to set up and adjust his car wash.
It’s sounds mundane, but to some, shaft collars are the best things since sliced bread.
At least they are to food equipment manufacturer Hobart, which uses the devices to make bread-slicers.
Freelance writer Ken St. Onge blogs about manufacturing in Connecticut at NutmegMachine.com
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