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IWC launches glass-reinforced plastics manufacturing facility

Company News Monday, May 27, 2013: Industrial Water Cooling (Pty) Ltd.

In response to the lack of local fiberglass manufacturing facilities and a growing demand for fibreglass equipment and piping, Industrial Water Cooling, IWC, officially launched its new glass-reinforced plastic (GRP) manufacturing facility in Isando, Ekhuruleni, which is one of only two GRP plants of this kind in South Africa. 

Before we launched this GRP facility, the biggest local supplier of industrial fibreglass was based in Durban. As we are based in Gauteng we offer transportation and lead time savings on GRP products for companies in and around Gauteng.

Owing to the gap in supply of industrial fiberglass solutions, existing companies were seemingly monopolising the industry. There is a growing demand for GRP across industries, as the composite offers many benefits to a wide range of users from food and beverage to mining and industrial applications.  IWC’s expertise in GRP will enable us to supply the various products at cost-effective and competitive rates. There is already much interest in our product offering.  On order at present at our GRP facility, we are manufacturing a number of storage tanks, agitator tanks, fan stacks and piping for clients including Omnia, Eskom, NCP Chlorchem, PDNA Industrial and Sasol. 

The establishment of the GRP facility was initiated in the beginning of 2012, during which we acquired two unrivaled, state of the art filament winding machines. These machines have the capacity to wind cylinders for piping, tanks or vessels with a diameter ranging from 25 mm to 5000 mm with an overall maximum complete product mass of 20 tons, on the large winder. 

IWC has been involved in the supply of GRP for many years, manufacturing cooling towers, fan stacks, ducting, distribution troughs and louvres at our premises in Midrand.  Now with the new manufacturing facility we are capable of supplying an extended range of GRP products and services and as a result we have expanded our offering to our market which extends from food and beverage, to chemical, metallurgical, mining, and petrochemical and water applications. 

As a result of this new GRP manufacturing facility IWC now offers:

The design and manufacture of:

• Freestanding GRP cells and GRP liners for electrolytic and electro winning metal refineries
• GRP scrubbers, cooling towers, process vessels and GRP storage tanks

The design, manufacture and installation of:

• GRP piping and fittings from 25mm up to 2500mm in diameter
• GRP ducting
• GRP overwrapped thermoplastics & fluoroplastics such as Polypropylene, HDPE, PVC, PVDF, PFA, ECTFE, etc. used for pipelines, fittings, tanks, process vessels, ducting, stacks, etc.
• Polypropylene, PVC and HDPE vessels and piping
• Underground storage tanks for petroleum storage
• Firewater mains
• GRP chimney stacks
• GRP corrosion resistant linings

On-site GRP repairs and maintenance

EPC projects

To offer a holistic industrial solution, IWC now supplies heat exchangers, cooling towers and GRP products, as well as their servicing and maintenance, to all industries.