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Pye-Barker was founded in the 1930s, when John Pye and Ben Barker decided to start their own company in Atlanta, Georgia. Both Georgia Tech graduates, the pair had been working together at Goodyear when they created a new way to cut conveyor belts into custom links. This was an exclusive, innovative concept in those days for which Pye-Barker became well known.

As the end of 2019 is near, it is not just an opportunity to reflect on this calendar year, but the end of a decade. Viking Pump® is proud to be a company with 108 years of history; built by employees, distributors, and customers with a deep care and understanding of the industry who feel motivated to solve the toughest pumping challenges. Let’s take a walk through some of the highlights of…

Rogers Machinery Company, Inc. was co-founded in 1949 by two war buddies, Ned Rogers and Walter M. Novak, who served together aboard the USS Reno in the South Pacific during WWII. These like-minded veterans followed their dream to build a business providing compressed air equipment and pumps to the Pacific Northwest (Portland, Oregon), home to the pulp and paper, aluminum, agriculture, and…

A gentleman once contacted me to let me know that he’d cracked a head, an impressive, but not entirely unheard-of feat.  When I asked how this had happened he admitted “well, I was wailing on it pretty hard”; I appreciated his honesty.  What followed was a 30-minute conversation full of mis-assumptions and confusion.  At the conclusion I discovered that he was not talking about a head (as in…

In the world of gear pumps, it is common to have liquid handling applications where pressure and vacuum are of concern. So, we wanted to share our perspective and recommendations, to help with making pump choices and decisions for the various pressure and/or vacuum scenarios you may encounter.

Kerr Pump & Supply, a notable first distributor of Viking pumps, has an illustrious 100+ years business history in the Detroit area. The company began manufacturing electric and steam driven centrifugal pumps under the name of Kerr Machinery & Supply, founded in 1905 by Alexander M. Kerr, along with his two sons, David and Robert, and incorporated in 1907. A profile written about…

An Engineering firm recently purchased three large internal gear pumps through a local distributor in northern Illinois. In this case, the pumps were intended to be a prime mover for loading their customer’s product—vacuum gas oil (VGO)—onto a transport barge. Traditional pumping technology, i.e., centrifugal pumps, was not a viable…

Industrial gear pumps have many uses in a wide array of market applications—ranging from food processing to pouring asphalt. A growing area in need of specialized gear pumps is in the oil and gas industry, particularly with regards to the removal of water from natural gas via dehydration. Viking Pump entered this market to support customers striving to deliver high-quality…

Asphalt, also known as bitumen, is a sticky, black, and highly viscous liquid, or semi-solid form of petroleum. Asphalt is man's earliest organic engineering material. Its application as an adhesive and waterproof material dates to the dawn of civilization. The asphalt market thrives today largely for road building, roofing, and various types of repair work where its…

On December 17, 1941- just 10 days after the attack on Pearl Harbor- the United States Congress approved the construction of the Coast Guard Cutter Mackinaw WAGB-83. The purpose of the ship was to forge a path for transport ships by breaking up thick ice that formed on the Great Lakes during frigid winter months. This allowed iron ore, limestone, and coal to be transported keeping…