Published in the December 2007 American Longwall Magazine
In fact, the ever-increasing production rates at mines have helped the four-year-old Illinois group broaden its foothold in the industry.
Midwest Equipment, also known as PJM Enterprises, was established by Phillip J McGilton in 2003 with four employees and has rapidly grown to 105 workers to provide the industry with new and rebuilt equipment. Among their specialties are manufacturing and rebuilding roof supports, pans, crawler mounted tailpieces and crushers, as well as rebuilding armored face conveyors, pump cars, stageloaders, drives, feeders, diesel equipment and other underground equipment.
“[We are] committed to becoming number one for quality and efficiency,” according to vice president of sales and marketing Paul Spedding, who joined the company in August. “Even though the company is still growing, the focus has been to keep overheads low to keep the shop rates low.”
The Midwest team, which has a total of 200 years of industry experience, has plenty of room to move and grow at its 60,000 square foot Creal Springs shop floor. It’s no surprise then, that the group is already setting records for itself and the industry.
“[Midwest] is the only company in the United States to build longwall shields with the record delivery time of 11 months for [a] complete set (of 185 to 195 shields).”
Spedding said part of Midwest’s mission to serve customers efficiently and with flexibility comes from being a young company as well as being willing to take on new challenges. “In this age of highly competitive coal mines, everyone is looking for an edge over their competition,” he said.
The company has also developed a unit called The WORM, a two-, four- or six-person vehicle to make miners’ commutes easier. Midwest is the only company to provide that kind of innovative equipment to the industry, Spedding said.
He admits the needs of the industry during the company’s infancy was somewhat limiting because of its own resource availability. Since then, its proven track record with products and service has helped Midwest grow and move forward with an unprecedented business level.
“Strategies have been implemented to give visibility to the capabilities of the company, and to move to the next step of evolution - expansion. We have provided a platform to a number of vendors to develop a unique logistic approach for the supply of parts and material to the mines, [and now] we are diversifying into the warehousing and supply of a vast range of parts to the mines.”
A company that began merely servicing and rebuilding has also grown to produce its own equipment, beginning with longwall shields in 2005 and, by 2007, panline.
The company is perhaps most proud of its stature as a US manufacturer of roof supports, a feat which began in 2004. “This decision was brought on by delivery and cost issues with the other manufactures. To date, we have manufactured 600-plus shields and 7-plus pan lines operating in the East and Midwest coalfields,” Spedding said.
He added that 10 of the company’s own line of CMT units are also working in US mines.
Looking ahead, Spedding said Midwest’s focus is on its expanding customer base: “Growing forward, the management team at Midwest Equipment is determined to gear up the production and add operation facility in the western coalfields (around Utah) by the end of 2007 and an operation facility in the eastern coalfields (around Pennsylvania-West Virginia) by first quarter of 2008, to have sound infrastructure physically closer to the mines.”
He added that the company plans to release a new personnel carrier in the new year as well as improve rebuild procedures.
