March 26, 2024

This paid piece is sponsored by Maguire.

Dan Engelsman’s career at Maguire began as a drafter 18 years ago.

Over nearly two decades, Engelsman has worked his way from the drafting table to senior vice president of construction operations, where he oversees fabrication and field operations.

Now, he is taking on his largest challenge: helping design a state-of-the-art fabrication facility to produce water tanks and towers more efficiently and cost-effectively than in Maguire’s current fabrication facility.

The new Maguire fabrication facility is north of Interstate 90 between Cliff Avenue and Interstate 229.

“We’ve talked many times over the years about upgrading the current facility or moving into a different facility,” Engelsman said. “Those talks became more serious in 2020 when we began sketching ideas on paper.”

Dan Engelsman, right, discusses the new Maguire fabrication facility with Gene Jones Jr., Maguire CEO.

Engelsman and the Maguire team began designing the new facility to solve the following shortcomings of their current facility as the company grew:

• Fabricating in multiple buildings.
• Workflow challenges.
• Age of buildings.
• Limitations of the building’s footprint.
• Lack of wall and crane height.
• Door heights and widths.
• Steel yard storage.

Solving these limitations would be the key to designing a modern fabrication facility.

“It was overwhelming to start,” Engelsman said. “You talk about a new facility and how great it is going to be, but when you have to start drawing it out, that is where the work begins.”

Engelsman, along with many other Maguire team members, began the process with discussions and a blank piece of paper.

“We started by looking at different shapes for the building,” Engelsman said. “We also spoke to and visited many different fabricators and manufacturers in the area and across the country from many different industries to help generate ideas.”

Construction crews hang precast wall panels for the new Maguire fabrication facility.

The first thing Engelsman and his team had to determine was production workflow. The workflow of steel through the facility was the key component to figuring out equipment placement and the overall size of the building.

“It was fun to get the entire team involved in the design of the building,” Engelsman said. “Everyone looks at it a little differently and has different ideas.”

One way the team began to generate ideas for equipment placement and workflow was to construct puzzle pieces for team members to place equipment in the footprint of the building until the picture was complete.

“We went through over 100 different equipment layouts based on the building’s dimensions,” Engelsman said. “It sounds elementary, but it helped everyone visualize where all the equipment could go to determine where it should go based on an optimal workflow scenario.”

Maguire team members take a tour of the new fabrication facility.

Simultaneously with the building layout, the fabrication team was looking at new fabrication equipment to make manufacturing safer and more efficient and to help produce higher-quality products.

“The new equipment we purchased was well researched,” Engelsman said. “We traveled around the country looking at the equipment being used by other large custom steel fabricators and speaking to the operators and asking questions to ensure each piece of equipment fit the criteria for the type of use we needed.”

These new pieces of equipment have been installed on the fabrication floor in Maguire’s new facility. Installing them was only the first step. A pilot team has been in the new facility testing the new machinery and building standard operating procedures to ensure a seamless transition from the current facility to the new one.

Maguire operator Kajun Lavender tests the new variable geometry plate roller.

“Each piece of equipment is brand-new,” Engelsman said. “It is one thing to have the machine’s specifications and read what it will do, but it is a whole other thing to put a piece of plate steel into it and begin forming it.”

Throughout the pilot phase, the Maguire team has learned new and more efficient ways to fabricate steel. These new efficiencies will put Maguire on the cutting edge of producing water tanks and towers.

“This has been an amazing experience for me and our entire team,” Engelsman said. “Not a day goes by when I get asked about the new facility. Everyone is excited to get into the new facility and begin fabrication. We expect big things.”

Maguire’s new fabrication facility will allow the company to double the output of water tanks it produces every year to meet industry demands.

Maguire team members test the new hydraulic press.

“Dan and our entire Maguire team have done amazing work getting us ready to move to our new home,” Maguire CEO Gene Jones Jr. said. “We are excited to move in and begin fabricating water tanks that will store and protect quality water for communities across the country.”

To learn more about the new Maguire fabrication facility, click here. Or you can listen to Episode 40 of “The Maguire Podcast.” On this episode, Dan Engelsman discusses more about the equipment chosen for the new fabrication facility.