2007 is a special year for ThyssenKrupp Gerlach in Homburg. The worldwide leading drop-forge for passenger car and commercial vehicle crankshafts celebrates its 60th anniversary.
When Karl Gerlach founded the company 60 years ago, he mostly had the manufacturing of iron mine props for the coal mining industries in Saarland and France in mind. He would never have thought that 60 years later the company would count every major automotive manufacturer among its customers, nor that it would be part of ThyssenKrupp’s global acting crankshaft group with facilities in Europe, the Americas and China. Today, ThyssenKrupp Gerlach produces approximately eight million crankshafts per year and employs 1,300 employees.
Starting in the mid 80’s, Gerlach became more and more internationally active. After the acquisition of the French crankshaft machining manufacturer Mavilor in 1985, a drop- forge was purchased in 1991 in Illinois (USA) and was followed by the acquisition of another forging line in Indiana in 1995. Since 2004, ThyssenKrupp Gerlach has also been present in China as part of the crankshaft group. A joint venture with the Japanese company Sumitomo produces passenger car crankshafts in Huizhou.
The demand for forged crankshafts has been on the rise over the past few years due to new developments in engine manufacturing and especially due to the steady increase of diesel engines. The forged crankshaft is a product with outstanding future prospects.This is certainly the result of the motivated employees in Homburg.
This is a development which makes Dr. Wolfram Mörsdorf, Executive Board member of ThyssenKrupp AG and Vice Chairman of ThyssenKrupp Technologies AG, feel optimistic: „I am sure that a staff that is qualified, motivated and ready to go above and beyond is the best basis for Gerlach’s future market success to be considered a competent supplier of the automotive industry despite the enormous pressure from the competition.”
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