Hammerhead Industrial Hose
Transporting large amounts of liquid long distances can be difficult and expensive; pumping the fluid through large-diameter, lay-flat hose is often the best solution. When done correctly, this simple, mobile and temporary solution avoids leakage of water or specialized liquids, which is an absolute necessity to avoid production delays and environmental spills.
Hammerhead Industrial Hose provides the highest level of reliability and quality by continually innovating new products and tools to aid in large-volume liquid transfers. The company distributes a wide variety of industrial hoses and manufactures all the equipment needed, such as manifolds, fittings, pipe, retrieval systems, pigging systems, filter pods and much more – basically everything except the pumps. They make their equipment out of aluminum, galvanized steel or high density polyethylene (HDPE); and they often treat the materials with special chemical-resistant coatings to meet the specific material requirements of their customers.
Hammerhead distributes lay-flat hose and many other types of specialty hose. Lay-flat hose has a woven structure similar to that of a fire hose and has either polyurethane or rubber extruded through the weave to provide a protective coating on the inside and outside for chemical and abrasion resistance and watertightness.
“We’re one of the few companies that offer both rubber or polyurethane hoses,” Vice President of Sales and Marketing Bob Morrison points out. “We also offer all of our fittings and hose-related equipment with a proprietary, chemical-resistant coating called FracGard to protect against chemicals for customers who need it.”
Hose Retrieval
Hammerhead also manufactures hose retrieval systems; its “tugger trailers” can retrieve and carry more than one mile of large-diameter, lay-flat hose and associated equipment. “The hose is very heavy, and each section of hose is up to 660 feet in length,” Morrison explains. “The tugger trailer makes the retrieval and transportation quick and efficient. You drive along the hose and run the tugger to pull the hose off the ground and into the trailer. Hammerhead also provides reel-based retrieval systems, as well as filter pod trailers, pigging equipment and everything else needed to transfer water and other fluids, with the exception of the pumps.”
The company’s pigging equipment is used to remove the fluid from the hose when finished with the transfer. Hammerhead provides the valves, lateral Ys, pig-launch tubes and pig catchers needed to shoot a pig through the hose and push the fluid out so it is easy to pick up and move to the next job location.
This equipment is fabricated out of steel, aluminum or HDPE. To provide a robust resistance to chemicals, the steel pieces are sent to a nearby company for hot-dip galvanizing while the aluminum pieces are anodized or coated with Hammerhead’s special FracGard coating. Oftentimes, Hammerhead will customize the pigging and other equipment to meet the needs of customers.
“We have a standard version of all of our products, but we often customize items to meet specific needs,” Morrison says. “Sometimes people come to us and say, ‘We have a whole new idea for something, can you build it for us?’ We have CAD software to design and build anything that somebody might need.” The company also provides worldwide consulting services on how to use its equipment in the most effective and safe manner.
Manufacturing Equipment
Hammerhead Industrial Hose does its manufacturing in its 21,000-square-foot custom fabrication shop at its headquarters in Houston. The company uses CNC machining tools to cut and shape many components, and its crew of welders and assemblers complete the manufacturing.
“We just modified our process flow at the beginning of this year for all equipment that we make,” Morrison says. “We renovated the flow of manufacturing to make it more efficient by creating one continuous stream from where we receive the raw material through the different manufacturing steps and finally to where it gets shipped out. It is now a much more streamlined process.”
Hammerhead also works to streamline its administrative tasks, using specific tools and methods to make sure enough product is available for immediate delivery while keeping inventory costs low. “We use software to keep track of things, but the human element is critical to determine how much market demand there is for the various items,” Morrison says. “Sometimes it’s hard to predict; it’s very much driven by the activity in the oilfield, mining, agriculture and general industrial needs.”
Hammerhead Industrial Hose’s products are distributed worldwide.
“One of the things that differentiates us is that we have a full solution for anyone looking to transfer either large volumes of fluid or to meet unique requirements” Morrison says. “We have reusable fittings that are rated as the best in the industry, we have a service trailer that can crimp and repair hose at the customer’s location, and we are continually developing new and better equipment to help our customers get their job done in the most efficient and safest way possible. Most of our competitors just sell a few pieces of equipment. We provide the full solution and consult on the best way to get the job done.
“We’re constantly innovating,” he says. “We are leading in the development of hose and related equipment that is chemical-resistant to handle the water which has been compromised with many chemicals that will eat through standard materials. We work hard to make sure we’re providing the best equipment for what’s needed.”