1) What is your company niche and what does your company do that is
notable,
unique or different? We have developed the software and hardware to design and produce
shape-optimized molded plastic gears. Prior to this, plastic gears
had been modeled on their metal counterparts. This simply didn’t
work well. Material properties are different, construction method
is different, geometric properties and tolerances are different.
About the only shared similarity is the basic gear involute
definition.
The motivating factors for producing the software were the lack of tools available
to optimally design or inspect molded plastic gears. The available
software was and still is invariably based more on cut metal gears.
Molded gearing requires a completely different approach to gain
best advantage and minimize inherent weaknesses. Plastic gears are
a very different animal from cut gears. Two huge differences are
(1) plastic gears in general are 10x weaker than their metal
counterparts; and (2) the tolerance environment with plastic gears
is probably 10x greater than metal gears because metal gears are
going to be made with a milling machine and most likely will be
within ten-thousandths of an inch. Plastic molded gears aren’t so
exact. You have to monitor their production more closely. The
advantage, though, to manufacturing plastic gears is that you can
save money with plastics. Other reasons are that there’s no
lubrication needed, they don’t rust, there’s no noise during
production, they’re lighter (very big reason with automotive OEMs),
plastic gears are chemically resistant and they’ll work in the
harshest environment – so there are many reasons to switch. |
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2)
When and how did you get into the industry, what attracted you to
it? I began my career as a research
and development engineer at the Hewlett-Packard Company. It was a
remarkable time when young engineers were encouraged to test
boundaries and innovate. I eventually moved on to another company
and was tasked with developing a plastic geared transmission for a
self-propelled vacuum cleaner. That simple task evolved up into
this career. That convinced me that there was an awful lot to
learn about plastic gears. In my mind, the engineering required to
make this small plastic part is much more sophisticated than the
engineering required making parts for aerospace, a field I also
worked in.
3) Relate a notable "best time" for your company.
There have been a lot of exciting
times, usually associated with an unprecedented success.
Unfortunately that is the norm in this business. Very little is
known because so much of what we do hasn’t been done before, and a
lot depends on using your best sense and then having even better
luck. We are very meticulous and we have a lot of very good
support, but this field is a challenge in every way.
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4)
Similarly, relate notable challenges that your company has overcome.
 Visibility has
always been the greatest challenge. In the early years we received
very little support in the industry because we didn’t advocate the
traditional way of developing molded gears. The emerging internet
was our salvation. We developed a technically intense web site and
began sharing information. I was actually kind of black listed by
my peers for a while there because I was sharing technology and
talking about how it’s done. No one wanted to expose the process,
the technology. They were afraid the competition would steel it.
But the engineers found us and that brought us work. I’ve never
tried to be cryptic with technology. I believe in networking and
sharing information that makes the industry stronger. |
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5) When you are working on projects with your customers, what aspects
would you like them to
better recognize?
 Oh, that is such a simple question with an equally simple answer.
My fondest hope is that eventually, the engineering public will
begin to realize that molded gears are not a simple commodity, even
though they are treated as such by so many. Engineering
thermoplastics are amazing materials that can excel or fail
spectacularly directly related to the amount of engineering and
production technology used in their design and manufacture.
There are about a
half a dozen companies in this country that claim to mold precision
gears. Even if they are successful at this task, the customer is
not well served if the molded gear has not been optimized for the
application. A similar analogy would be a doctor prescribing
aspirin to a diabetic patient because the patient insists that is
the proper remedy. The problem is confounded if the molder can’t or
won’t profile inspect the molded gear to confirm the dimensional
conformance of the gear geometry.
6)
List newly acquired technology, machinery or
key personnel (in last
year).
In the past year we have begun our journey to develop this gearing
system for high volume applications. My original intent 15 years
ago was to be a custom molded gear designer. I soon discovered that
each step of the process from initial design through final
manufacture had to be totally controlled for any chance of success.
I believe we have some of the best toolmakers here in Minnesota and
we have worked closely with them to develop the best tooling. Our
gear design and inspection software is proven
 and stable. We have
been able to optimize mold process control with our Arburg molding
machines. Developing personnel and facilities will be the next
large step in precision high volume molding. This is a necessary
progression because the required engineering for this effort is too
much for any one customer to support on a consulting basis. We hope
to continue attracting repeat customers because our design and
quality control gives them the most overall cost-effective product,
and we act as their alliance partner in all gearing issues and
questions. A gear alone is a useless artifact when, in fact, the
functioning transmission is the actual final product. |
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7) Has your company recently expanded? Plans to expand or form
partnerships/alliances?
We are currently
in the process of moving from a 3,000-square-foot space to our own
14,000-square-foot building, so I guess that must certainly qualify
as expansion. We have alliances with some precision tool makers and
an EDM shop in the Twin Cities with a history of successful mold
tools in our back pockets. We have tried to form alliances with
larger molders, but found them incapable of meeting our
requirements for process control and part inspection. We plan to
be up and running in our new location by the last week of October.
8)
Are you involved in any industry organizations or educational
programs related to
the trade?
For
more than 15 years I have been attending the American Gear
Manufacturer’s Association (AGMA) Plastic Gearing Committee
meetings. A few others and I have fought to redefine the
specification, inspection and testing of molded plastic gears. To
date I have to report very minimal success, but hope is
 eternal.
The United States should dominate the industry of precision molded
gearing. We have everything needed to define and develop this
product first in the world, everything except the will to do it.
We
have started to develop process techniques that have given us
better outcomes with new materials. We’ve found that not much
research has been done in the area of material strength in such
products as gears. For instance, material properties are based on
relatively low speed application of force on large test bars. A
gear tooth is most often loaded with the near equivalent to a short
term sliding contact impact load. Material properties based on test
bars are only vaguely pertinent to the molded gear designer. |
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9)
What do you think about changes occurring in the industry due to
globalization? How has it
affected the way you do business?
What? Do you mean
how are we managing to stay up stream when our political leaders
are selling us down the river? I don’t actually know the answer to
that. Politics seems to be no longer based on reality. It is a game
show of approval ratings. There are apparently no consequences for
bad decisions. The manufacturing future looks bleak to me. I will
simply choose to focus on our product and trust that our best
efforts will be good enough to keep us productive and employed.
10) What will the industry look like in 3 to 5 years?
 Different. My
dearest hope is that this whole thing will turn around – everything
does eventually. We’ve never had this big of an imbalance in terms
of trade, especially with China. When we come down and they come
down things are going to be very dicey. The good side of this is
that in gearing, they [Chinese manufacturers] don’t have the best
technology. We use the very best engineers and employ the best
technology we can get our hands on here at Kleiss. I believe we
have a very good chance of competing with foreign competition on
price, especially as we get into the high cavitation tooling and
faster processes, along with holding tolerances very closely. |
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Additional Background Information |
 Number of years in business:
14 years
Current number of employees:
6
Current square footage:
3,000 currently; moving to new 14,000-square-foot building Oct. 15th
(at time of publication)
Additional locations: None
at this time
Website
www.kleissgears.com
Industries served: We
serve a wide variety of industries, from medical to automotive.
Contact information:
Rod
Kleis, Kleiss Gears, Inc.
New address:
390
Industrial Blvd
Grantsburg, WI 54840
Ph: 715-463-5995
Fax: 715-463-5996
Cell phone: 651-308-8937
E-mail address:
kleiss@kleissgears.com
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