Oxford, Rock City
That's right. Oxford. And more specifically, an industrial park not far from I-395, the home of Renaissance Wire, which makes the high carbon steel core for some of the biggest and best-known guitar string manufacturers in the world.
The 11-employee operation has been in the town's industrial park off Town Forest Road since a fire displaced it from its facility in Millbury about four years ago. Owners Joe and Diane Mancini founded the company in 2000.
High Strung
From its modest-looking plant, Renaissance makes steel core for Ernie Ball and D'Addario guitar strings. The string companies themselves wrap the guitar strings with nickel and copper.
But Renaissance, which is one of the last steel wire manufacturers in the region, doesn't stop with guitar strings. The company has customers in Mexico, India, China, Germany, Italy, England and elsewhere that make strings for violins, sitars and other instruments.
But don't think Renaissance is the lone interesting company in the town's industrial park. Nearly every company there does or makes something interesting, important or both.
On Hawksley Road is Swissturn USA, a company that started in the shadow of the Waltham Watch Co. When Waltham Watch went out of business, one of its employees, John Mandile, took his experience in the precision manufacturing of small parts and started Swissturn. The company now makes precision small components for laboratory equipment, office machines and other applications out of stainless steel, metals and plastic. Two of the company's better-known customers are Xerox and Raytheon. Swissturn's products are made on "Swiss screw" machines, machine lathes that allow the tool that shapes the product to move around.
Magnetic Technologies Inc. on Town Forest Road makes modular, permanent magnet brakes, clutches and couplings for the wire and cable, fiber optics, aerospace, medical and other industries.
In about 10,000 square feet on nearby Harlan Road, Line Bore makes machined packaging for the electronics, radio frequency microwave and communications market.
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