Valve Magazine - Fall 2010

MAINTENANCE & REPAIR

BY GENILEE PARENTE

Valve Repair Companies: Where the Real Value Lies

It’s unwise to pay too much, but it’s worse to pay too little. When you pay too much you lose a little money, that’s all. When you pay too little, you sometimes lose everything, because the thing you bought was incapable of doing the thing it was bought to do.

—John Ruskin

That famous quote from social thinker John Ruskin was sent in to Valve Magazine from Urmimala Mukhopadhyay, marketing analyst for Cameron Valves & Measurement. It summarizes very well what many Valve Repair Council (VRC) members feel is the main danger of not using an OEM-certified company in making valve repairs.

“Most fly-by-night repair facilities offer products and services at a much cheaper price. But more often than not, these repair shops do not have the technical knowledge, experience, capability or resources to handle the maintenance and repair of valves to OEM specifications. Relying on these often leads to cost consequences,” Mukhopadhyay explained.

Mukhopadhyay was one of the VRC company representatives who responded to VM’s call to tell us why companies should join VRC, the advantages of belonging, and most importantly, the advantages end users gain by seeking out a VRC member. We also spoke with Darrell Roberts, owner of Wal-Tech; Kim Beise, president of Dowco Valve Company; and Cliff Smith, director of Operations & Service, Flow Control/Automation Business Line, Metso Automation, Inc.

Darrell Roberts, who has just a few
years in the valve repair industry, says
he is amazed at how many end users
have little to no knowledge of the bene-
fits of using an OEM-certified repair
facility, a requirement for service and
repair companies that wish to join the
Valve Repair Council. He tells this
story:
“We almost lost a major client
because they did not understand what an
obsolete valve was.” The client would
call and request a quote for a repair, then
when Wal-Tech would explain that parts
were not available, the client would find
a shop that would make repairs without
question. “When I discovered what was
going on, I made it a point to ask, during
the next meeting with our client (a meet-
ing attended by a regional manager, a
reliability manager and several other
high-level company reps), ‘do you know
what an obsolete valve is?’ Not one of
them knew!” he explains.

PHOTOS BY GREG JOHNSON, UNITED VALVE ‘assume’ our clients know and understand the valve business,” but this is simply not always true, he says. As a result, repair companies need to understand how to educate their customers because: “an educated client is the best client we can have,” he says.

But even companies not dealing with the small “fly-by-night” repair shops face real dangers in not using OEM-certified companies, VRC members point out.

“Many of these ‘repair shops’ are quite large,” says Metso’s Smith. However, because they do not belong to an organization such as VRC, they often just don’t have access to OEM specs. As a result, “they are either reverse engineering components or they are purchasing parts from the OEM. Since they cannot be competitive when buying the OEM parts, they are much more likely to reverse engineer,” Smith adds.

But it’s not just the dangers of reverse engineering that should encourage valve companies to seek out an OEM-certified repair facility.

A significant advantage of an OEM service center is the engineering support, Smith points out. “We will not only repair older equipment and restore products to OEM specs, we will review performance issues and provide upgrades and alternative solutions,” Smith continues.

Also, the processes that involve valves themselves change over time so products that were appropriate years ago may no longer be adequate or they may have been improved, which a user is much more likely to know if they are dealing with an OEM-certified company. Meanwhile, however, “non-OEMs service by repairing old, and often obsolete, equipment for as long as possible,” he concludes.