Since it's founding in 1946, Hitchiner has become the world's leading producer of low cost, high quality precision (investment) castings for commercial applications. Investment castings are precise dimensionally, have the smoothest surface finishes of any castings in most alloys, and are available in more alloys than from any other process for shaping metals. The 2700 Hitchiner employees in seven plant locations are organized to provide rapid prototype service for a few parts or provide quick delivery of orders for a few dozen parts, and to provide thousands per day - as castings only, as finished machined parts, or as assemblies to provide "one stop" shopping for our customers. These assemblies consist of metal and plastic parts made in many processes other than investment casting. More than ninety engineers and metallurgists with experience in all forms of metal part manufacture are available to assist you with design, support development and plan production activities. They know if a part should be a casting or should be another process and will make the recommendation best for you, the customer.

You can take advantage of this experience by contacting Hitchiner. Our engineers will review the part function, ambient conditions, stress levels, life needed, stiffness needed, type of loading (continuous or cyclic), and special considerations such as magnetic, thermal expansion or electrical needs, to assist with alloy selection. They can then assist with consideration of manufacturing approaches and test designs in those approaches to see which process best fits the alloy and cost objectives of the part or assembly. The goal is to produce the lowest cost part, which will provide the desired performance, regardless of the manufacturing process selected. Achieving this may include simplifying the design, reducing the number of parts needed in an assembly, incorporating features to enhance performance, while keeping machining and assembly costs low. If investment castings result from the study, Hitchiner can assist you with the design to make certain the lowest cost results. If the requirement is an assembly, which requires an investment casting, Hitchiner may submit a proposal for doing the complete assembly. In any event, Hitchiner would at least assist you in contacting another company, if needed, to refine the design and obtain pricing. Hitchiner knows its customer's best interest is its best interest and will always make the best recommendation for the customer, regardless of the manufacturing process needed for the part.

If you decide to work with Hitchiner, you can count on it for rapidly made prototypes, finite element analysis design support, handling of CAD/CAM software of any kind, short lead time for tooling, installation of whatever facilities are required to support production, and production in facilities which are qualified to the most stringent international and major company quality standards. If your needs are not met well by any current processes, Hitchiner can use its joint (with General Motors) venture development company, Metal Casting Technology, Inc. (MCT), to develop an entirely new approach. MCT personnel have received more than 150 patents.

Show our representatives what you do and they will arrange for our engineers to study your part or assembly requirement to see if we can help reduce your cost and make your product better.

Contact us and let us be of service!

Read our brief guide on how to request a quote for investment casting.