The IFH Group was established in 1945 as King’s Weld Shop of Rock Falls, Ill., a small weld repair shop. It was incorporated in 1966 as J. L. King Co. Inc., taking on fabrication work. As the company grew, its name was changed to Sauk Valley Equipment Co. The balance of the building where the company is located today was completed, and two additional expansion programs were finished.
When the facility was updated, the manufacturing equipment went through a major renovation process and the name of the corporation was changed to The IFH (for Innovative Fluid Handling) Group Inc. Throughout the company’s evolution, its products and services have been vastly expanded and improved. Through R&D and a highly trained staff, the organization now has the ability to design and fabricate products customized to customers’ exact specifications.
There are two primary operations at The IFH Group, the first of which is the manufacturing of hydraulic oil reservoirs and fuel tanks. The second focus is manufacturing fluid storage and dispensing equipment, as well as fluid transportation equipment.
The company says it is the largest manufacturer in the U.S. of custom steel fuel and hydraulic oil tanks for off-road and specialty vehicles. Applications include combines, heavy terrain forklifts, earth boring equipment, boom cranes, groundskeeping equipment, end loaders and hay bailers. Fuel tanks and hydraulic reservoirs range in capacities from 1 to more than 300 gal, and are manufactured from steel, stainless steel, aluminum or aluminized steel.
The IFH Fluid Storage and Dispensing System stores product close to the work area, cutting handling costs up to 80%. Ease of product flow cuts retrieval time up to 50-70% over drums or pumps. There is no drum tipping, pump cleaning or switching, and no major pump replacement costs.
IFH recently completed an expansion, increasing its overall square footage to more than 121,000 under a single roof. This addition houses the company’s non-ferrous manufacturing lines, enabling it to streamline all areas of production from incoming raw materials to shipment of completed fabrications and tanks—this helps to shorten customer lead times. IFH is now able to expand its ferrous manufacturing by creating capacity and increasing its capability of supplying large fabrications and tanks. Dedicated prototype cells, dedicated employee weld testing cells, and four major welding cells with large-capacity material handling equipment have been added. More improvements are on the horizon—they are expected to be completed by end of the second quarter of 2013.
