Still a place in Springfield for manufacturing, but jobs have changed

Even as one of the oldest names in local manufacturing prepares to leave town, in the form of Honeywell Hobbs Corp., Thomas Debrey says there remains a place for old-fashioned production jobs in Springfield.

Well, not so old-fashioned anymore.

Debrey, the third-generation head of Simplex Corp. — a local manufacturer of electrical testing and fuel-production systems — says traditional mass-production jobs probably are gone for good. According to state figures, manufacturing accounted for about 3,300 jobs in a Springfield-area work force of more than 112,400 at the end of 2009.

But Debrey said there is room for a new breed of small and medium-sized manufacturers, even in a town dominated by health care and state government.

“We do not have a manufacturing base, but the notion that Springfield is bad for manufacturing, or doesn’t need manufacturing is false,” said Debrey. “Springfield has been a good location. We have transportation, available land, a good labor market and standard of living, and you don’t have the congestion.”

Simplex products go across the country and overseas, including to major corporate names such as Boeing, Caterpillar, General Electric and Sundstrand. The U.S. military is also a customer for devices used in calibrating fuel and electrical testing systems.

Hospitals nationwide use Simplex products to provide back-up electrical power in emergencies.

High-tech production

Don’t look for smokestacks at the west-side plant. In fact, extraction and filtering systems pull welding, paint and other fumes out of workspaces to be recycled.

Debrey describes work that goes on at the Simplex plant — steel fabrication, welding, painting and wiring — as “medium manufacturing.”

Production workers account for most of the 140-employee work force at Simplex, but the company also hires engineers, designers and other high-tech skills. Even front-line fabrication and assembly work requires skills in electronics, math and computers, said Debrey.

Electrostatic paint

Linda Standish of Dawson went to work at Simplex right out of high school. Her first entry-level job was threading wiring into amp-testing cabinets. Three decades later, she supervises wiring crews.

“When I got out (of high school), I didn’t know what I was doing,” said Standish.

She learned most of her skills on the job as the technology changed, including the transition to computer-driven production. Sifting through a stack of wiring blueprints, Standish said she never gave much thought to another line of work.

“I’d rather do this kind of work than anything else. It’s something new every day,” said Standish.

Scott Young of Springfield says he is a painter by trade, has been for 30 years. But the “painting” has nothing to do with brushes or cans. The paint isn’t even a liquid.

“Electrostatic painting,” he explains, relies on positive and negative charges, so that the talcum-powder-like paint sticks to the steel much like static electricity sticks to fabric.

“It has a tendency to wrap around, and it’ll go places you can’t get to with paint,” said Young, who has worked at Simplex for about seven years.

Young wears a full protective suit and headgear as he attaches what appears to be a large battery jumper cable to a steel frame and a black fog of paint/powder drifts toward the charged metal.

The steel is then baked in what looks to be an oversized pizza oven, a process that also is much faster than traditional painting, said Young.

Laser beams

Rob Young of Chatham alternates between stacking fabricated steel and programming the Tru Laser 2030.

“It burns holes in sheet metals,” he says by way of explaining the basics of the bus-sized welder.

Very precise holes, actually. Young punches the specifications into a computer screen.

“I just set it and check it every now and then,” said Young, who also is responsible for sorting and stacking the finished product, which is used in steel testing cabinets.

There are still traditional painting and welding booths at the factory, but Debrey said computer-driven systems are the future.

The right space, skills

Simplex operations were housed in 14 buildings at 14 locations when the company relocated to the existing plant in 2006. The main operations previously were on North MacArthur Boulevard.

The facility at Wabash Avenue and Interstate 72 had been vacant since 2002, when John Deere relocated electronic-components manufacturing from its Springfield plant to one in North Dakota.

Space is a challenge for Springfield when it comes to small and mid-sized manufacturing, said Debrey.

“Springfield has a lot of empty buildings, but it doesn’t have a lot of big empty buildings. It’s 20,000, 30,000 and 50,000 square feet. We needed 100,000 square feet,” said Debrey.

The original, 90,000-square-foot plant has been expanded since Simplex moved in, he said.

The departure of traditional manufacturing also has taken with it the tradition of production skills handed from one generation to the next, said Debrey.

Debrey said Simplex has taken the same hit as other manufacturers as a result of the recession. The work force dropped from 180 before the financial market meltdown in 2008 to 130 before rebounding a bit this year.

Even with relatively high unemployment, Debrey said, it can be difficult to find the right mix of worker skills.

“We’re a technology company. We need wiring technicians, engineers, testing technicians, welders and tool makers,” said Debrey. “We don’t have a manufacturing skilled labor force (in Springfield), but we do have a good pool of people.”

Tim Landis can be reached at 788-1536

Hobbs plant to go on market

The Honeywell Hobbs manufacturing plant at 11th and Ash streets will go on the market once operations are relocated to Mexico.

The parent company announced last fall it would move production of electronic components for transportation to Juarez by the end of 2010. Honeywell cited the need to remain competitive in a global marketplace. The local plant has 140 employees.

“We are still in the process of getting a market assessment, and we’re hoping to have it on the market about mid-year,” said spokesman Mark Hamel.

Hamel said the company plans to use the Chicago real estate firm of Colliers B&K.

John W. Hobbs founded the Springfield company in 1938. Honeywell Hobbs purchased the facility in 2002.

– Tim Landis

Former manufacturers

Hobbs Corp. is one of the oldest manufacturing names remaining in Springfield, at least for now. Other large-scale manufacturers that are now history include:

* Fiatallis. Closed 1985. In its heyday, the heavy-equipment plant had a work force of 2,000. Retail and office buildings — ranging from Starbucks to an FBI headquarters — have filled in the site.

* Sangamo Electric. Manufactured electric meters from 1899 to 1978. Site at Ninth Street and North Grand Avenue now headquarters of the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency.

* Howden Buffalo. Industrial-fan manufacturer closed the plant at 3501 Mayflower Blvd. in 2003, after more than 25 years. Some mixed-use tenants are now using portions of the west-side facility.

* Pillsbury/Cargill. Pillsbury Corp. operated the mill on the northeast side of Springfield from 1921 to 1991, when Cargill purchased the facility. The plant closed in 2001 and was later sold to a salvage company. Remains vacant.

* Illini Technology. Software design and electronic manufacturing company founded in 1983 was purchased by Phoenix International Corp. in 1996. After moving to a new plant at Wabash Avenue and Interstate 72 in 1998, Phoenix was acquired by John Deere Co. John Deere closed the plant in 2002 at cost of 200 jobs. Now home to Simplex Corp.

Source: State Journal-Register archives

Job count

At the end of 2009, manufacturing accounted for about 3,300 jobs out of a work force of more than 112,400 in Sangamon and Menard counties, according to data from the Illinois Department of Employment Security.

Here is the annual average from 2000-2009.

2000: 4,100

2001: 3,900

2002: 3,800

2003: 3,500

2004: 3,400

2005: 3,400

2006: 3,400

2007: 3,500

2008: 3,500

2009: 3,300

The definition of manufacturing

“It’s taking raw materials and converting it into finished goods,” said Ron Payne, a labor-market economist with the Illinois Department of Employment Security.

The official definition changed eight years ago in response to the explosion of information-technology jobs.

“Newspapers used to be in manufacturing,” Payne said. “The information sector now is the publishing industry, motion pictures, broadcasting, all the cable companies, telecommunications and data processing.”

About Simplex Corp.

* Started by Michael Debrey in 1938 in Burlington, Iowa. Later moved to Moline and came to Springfield in 1952. Debrey’s grandson, Tom, is now company president.

* Manufactures electrical testing and fuel-supply systems, primarily for other manufacturers but also for emergency generator systems at hospitals and other institutions.

* On the Web: www.simplexdirect.com.

Read the original article from The State Journal-Register.