Salem’s newest industry is open.
618 Plastics is located in a newly constructed 35,000 square foot building on Selmaville Road just north of West Main Street.
Their first customer is their next-door neighbor North American Lighting.
President Don Hall says they currently have six employees and expect to grow to 15 to 20 by the end of the year as new business flows in. The company moved into its new facility the week after Thanksgiving and has now been in operation for about six weeks.
“So far, we’ve had no defects get out of the plant,” Hall said. “Quality is our thing that we have to push for the most. Equipment-wise, we’ve had no downtime in the last four or five weeks. Everything’s running great, so we’re just excited about getting the rest of the machines up and going.
Hall says owner Aaron Robb is talking to companies across the country on molding design and then plastic manufacturing.
“We’re an injection molding company, and we take plastic which is in a pellet form, and we have molds that are built for certain parts… these machines can run any type of mold. We take that mold and we put it into the press. The presses are of different sizes. Right now, we have a 250-ton press, 3 390-ton presses and one 720-ton press. The difference in those sizes is the amount of injection force that the machine can hold the mold closed. When the plastic is injecting into the mold, the machine has to hold the mold closed so that it doesn’t blow the mold open.”
Hall says they have a first of its dryer system built in Italy that allows changes in the process by the push of a button.
Hall notes NAL has to outsource a number of their molding projects, and he feels there is no better place to do it than next to the NAL facility in Salem.
Photo by Bruce Kropp.
