Menomonee Valley
Foundry.
A working light foundry at 1110 W. Bruce Street in the Menomonee Valley. On the books since 2019. Five assemblies protecting the cooling loop, the quench bath, the acid-pickling rinse, and a 6″ fire service. Glycol and acid hazards. The hardest test sequence on our books.
The building
1110 W. Bruce Street is a 1923 brick-and-steel-truss industrial building in the Menomonee Valley, on the south bank of the river about a mile west of our shop. The building was originally an Allis-Chalmers pattern shop, was light-industrial through the 1960s, and has operated as an independent jobbing foundry since 1981 under its current ownership. The four-story north wing houses the office and the pattern storage; the long single-story south wing holds the cupola, three induction furnaces, the molding line, and the cooling loop.
The building sits inside the Menomonee Valley redevelopment district and is one of the last working foundries inside Milwaukee city limits. The owner's father is the second-generation foundryman; he started his apprenticeship inside this building in 1971 and bought the operation from his employer in 1992.
Foundry processes
The foundry runs five wet processes that touch the city water and therefore touch our work:
- Cooling-water loop · induction furnace
A closed loop dosed with 30% propylene glycol plus a sodium-nitrite corrosion inhibitor. Makeup water from the city via a 2″ RP.
- Quench bath · steel parts
Plain potable water in a steel tank. Submersion temperatures touch 95 °C; back-pressure from the heated tank is a real concern.
- Acid-pickling rinse · cleaning station
Citric and phosphoric acid bath followed by potable rinse. The rinse line is isolated from the city water by a dedicated RP.
- Sand-mold cooling spray
Light atomized water spray over green-sand molds. Plain potable; isolated by an RP at the spray controller.
- Fire service · sprinkler riser
6″ wet-pipe system, no antifreeze (the south wing stays above 50 °F year-round due to furnace radiance). Moderate hazard. DCDA at the service entry.
Initial survey (2019)
The foundry account came to us in May 2019 after the prior contractor (a residential plumbing firm with no foundry experience) failed two consecutive annual filings. The initial walk-through took two full days because the building's mechanical schematic was hand-drafted in 1957 and didn't reflect ten major process changes since.
The 2019 findings:
- The cooling-loop RP (Apollo 4ALF-500, 2″) had a CK-2 diaphragm with visible attack from glycol. We rebuilt during the walk-through. The customer was puzzled — they'd never been told the diaphragm was a glycol-sensitive component.
- The quench-bath isolation was a DC, not an RP. Replaced with a Watts 909 (1.5″) the following month.
- The acid-pickling RP (Wilkins 375, 1.5″) was intact and functioning; we kept it on annual rotation.
- The sand-mold spray controller had no isolation. We added a Watts 909 (3/4″, later upgraded to 1″).
- The fire-service DCDA (Watts 709, 6″) was 16 years old and tested marginal. We rebuilt the bypass-meter check during the visit.
The glycol that ate the diaphragm
The cooling loop is the assembly that defines the rhythm of this account. Propylene glycol at 30% in a steel loop attacks EPDM diaphragms over years; the manufacturer's published life of seven to ten years on a treated municipal-water RP is in the foundry context closer to three to five. We've rebuilt the cooling-loop RP three times since 2019 (2019, 2022, 2025). Each rebuild has used a glycol-rated EVA diaphragm rather than the stock EPDM, which is a special order from Apollo and stays in our cabinet as a single sealed kit.
The current cooling-loop RP (replaced 2025) is on a mid-year test schedule — we test it in May and again in November to catch any diaphragm fatigue before it produces a fail. The cost of the mid-year test ($420) is materially smaller than the cost of an emergency rebuild during foundry production hours ($1,800 + a planned production stoppage). The customer pays for the certainty.
Current protection (2026)
| # | Process | Assembly | Hazard | Last test | Next |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3.1 | Cooling loop | Apollo 4ALF-500 · 2″ RP · AP-318822 | High (glycol) | 2026-05-14 · Fail — CK-2 fouled | Re-test 2026-05-22 (kit ordered) |
| 3.2 | Quench bath | Watts 909 · 1.5″ RP · WT-228005 | High (back-pressure) | 2026-05-14 · Pass | 2027-05 |
| 3.3 | Acid-pickling rinse | Wilkins 375 · 1.5″ RP · ZW-12118 | High (acid) | 2026-05-14 · Pass | 2027-05 |
| 3.4 | Sand-mold spray | Watts 909 · 1″ RP · WT-441290 | High | 2026-05-14 · Pass | 2027-05 |
| 3.5 | Fire service | Watts 709DCDA · 6″ DCDA · WT-709-660 | Mod fire | 2026-05-14 · Pass | 2027-05 |
Annual rhythm
Annual test happens on a Tuesday in mid-May during the foundry's quarterly maintenance shutdown. Stoltzfus runs the fire-service test (with the alarm-monitoring company on-test); Ferraro runs the four process RPs. Total time on site: 6 hours 20 minutes in 2026. Mid-year test in November (cooling-loop only): about 90 minutes.
References
- American Foundry Society — Industry standards. afsinc.org
- Menomonee Valley Partners. themenomoneevalley.com
- EPA Effluent Guidelines — Foundry sector. epa.gov/eg
- OSHA Foundry standards. osha.gov/foundries
- Wisconsin DNR — Industrial wastewater discharge. dnr.wisconsin.gov
- NFPA 484 — Combustible metals (foundry-relevant). nfpa.org