This interview series is with John Foster, Managing Director at Sarum Hydraulics LTD. A true engineer at heart, John designs, engineers and manages a company that has a passion for innovative and high quality products. 

Let’s talk about your industries, who do you serve?

Sarum Hydraulics have built a very wide customer base over 37 years. Units have found their way into every industry where people are looking to use a hand pump to pressure test, dispense, charge, actuate, calibrate, jack or work hold. Often these are one off units and people only come back after fifteen years when they need a seal kit. Volume users of our kit are the medical, aerospace, defence, fire, offshore, process industry as well as the more generic “hydraulics” industry.

What piqued your personal interest in this field?

It’s a familiar story for good products that have established a place in the market. In this case it is a family business with three clever designers involved. Ron, John and Tony Foster as a father and two sons must have pumps in their DNA. The Micropac pump came from a sales enquiry on an exhibition stand. A big plc couldn’t find a decent hand pump that would operate an innovative trench shoring system using water - that was 37 years ago. People still need a decent high-pressure hand pump that will cope with multiple fluids, offer very low corrosion and an extended service life. Professionals still value those features today. I reckon it is still a unique product in the world.

How did you end up solving your customers problems? 

Wind turbines have been big for Sarum Hydraulics. And so has our range of compact and inexpensive cartridge hand pumps that are installed into a C10-2 cavity in a manifold. We solved wind turbine manual hydraulics problems by offering the right level of corrosion resistance where it was needed, normally replacing legacy units that kept on failing. Whether it is was hostile environments in the North Sea, India, the Gobi Desert or any number of other locations, we have been able to offer precise solutions from stock parts. Fitting hard chromed 316 stainless piston rods to entry level models to fight corrosion or over-engineering a handle mechanism to battle misuse have been important to our customers.

Tell me about the location of some of your installations…

Micropac pumps have always had the travel bug! Diving bells and sub-sea actuators are one extreme. Ground support equipment to test jet engines or dispense Eastman Chemical “skydrol” are flown around the world. Valve actuators in extremely cold regions truly test our low temperature know-how. There are few hospitals in the UK that don’t have our equipment in them. Wind turbines in the Gobi Desert use our innovative cartridge pumps. Swagelok travels the world with Micropac and a Chinese firm buying our kit for their domestic wind turbines in the last few years has been a big achievement for a specialist British manufacturer.

What are you currently working on?

I am working on a few new units that will go into our catalogue and will find international demand through the internet. Our 316 stainless steel equipment is high quality, very cost effective and has a solid following. We are slowly adding complementary products to the 316 range. Making life easy for international customers, even at the design stage, is big for me. The days of purely thinking of the British market are long gone.

Tell me your product of the moment?

Our new MD series two speed 316 stainless two speed pump is our star. Having made big numbers of a chunky anodised alloy two speeder that sold against various legacy models for testing and jacking, I agonised about how to cut the space envelope right down and make it in 316 stainless for true corrosion resistance. I did it with our Micropac MD two speed pump, and we have people from all over the world buying them. It’s great!

What do you especially like in the Swagelok product range and why?

We go back to day one with Swagelok. Our call when we designed our Micropac pump back in 1982 was that you needed to make a well-engineered, quality product that was easy for Offshore and Aerospace to specify. And what a great fit the Swagelok range has been with our kit. Whether it has been fittings, valves or couplings, Swagelok has been the first port of call over all those years. It is nicely made as well, which unsurprisingly still counts for Engineers.

Which Swagelok products have worked particularly well for your business?

The double ferrule fittings are a joy to use for our fitters and are the first choice on any pipework. I still love working with them. Over the years we have used lots of small pipe end check valves and relief valves. The C series check valves and adjustable cracking pressure CP or CPA are amazingly useful in the right application. I still rate the integral bonnet needle valves like the SS-1RS4. They have a lovely feel compared with the competition! And finally, we use loads of Swagelok 316 hollow hexagon blanking plugs SS-HPST. We’re fans. I use them wherever I can on new designs.

Tell me a success story…

Even niche products mount up over 37 years. Somebody came to us with an aerospace test unit that was used throughout the world. The legacy design was massively complicated, including some truly exotic US parts, we simplified our design, using a modular Micropac hand pump incorporating all the control valves for the fluid system running on jet fuel. The original unit used a chunky four way valve and our masterstroke that really made this product was to integrate a Swagelok multi-way instrumentation ball valve SS-43Y into our unit. It fits the job perfectly. It has been a great success story for our company.

Do you prefer focusing on small sections of a fluid system or is a whole overview generally more productive in terms of ROI?

That is an interesting question for a firm who sell roughly equal values of a specialist pump component that somebody else will integrate into their fluid system and also Micropac pumps as finished test units ready for use. What wouldn’t work on an operational level for us is manufacturing whole fluid systems from bought in parts. In the internet age, I think we have become more interested in growing the business through adding new catalogue pump products with a global market. There is still a place for one off fluid systems achieved by customising our Micropac pumps and adding components like Swagelok parts to meet a customer requirement. Lots of “one-offs” are actually sold throughout the world. Micropac pumps have always been modular and able to be customised very cost effectively.

Want a Micropac hand pump fitted with a neat Swagelok 4CPA low pressure relief valve? No problem.

Terminate a delivery hose in an industry-standard Swagelok SS-QC8 female quick coupler? Easy!

We can add value using proven quality parts that are known anywhere in the world.

How many projects are you working on at any time?

Ask any designer and they will be thoughtful! There are always the big commercial products of the day, products that bubble on and hopefully will come good at the end of a long process in contrast there are those products that never quite happened for some reason but will feed into something else that fires up.

What are the 3 most essential systems or tools you use to complete your project?

3D modelling meets old fashioned drawing at Sarum.

Innovative products need good ideas at the design stage. A mix of tried and tested plus a new way of doing something or a new material.

Let me illustrate the design process at Sarum Hydraulics.... ideas take shape on Fabriano paper using lovely Pentel pencils or flow into Solidworks and Autocad. Information and specifications of 3rd party items are researched through supplier websites and catalogues. Our vintage Swagelok catalogue is still there alongside the web site. Finally, 37 years of experience helps us develop a product through to launching it in our catalogue and calling it “Micropac.”

For us the three design essentials are;

• Ideas
• Supplier Information
• Lengthy Experience

What are the benefits of using Swagelok in your opinion?

Nicely engineered quality products make a great first impression. They are a pleasure to install and use.

How do customers start conversations with you?

We still love talking to people. It is always exciting to chat to designers, specifiers or even the end user. They telephone us or send an e-mail. Now they are even asking questions through Twitter or our Sarum Hydraulics YouTube channel. If a customer can’t find exactly what they want from a catalogue or have a specific problem, there will be some reason why they will contact us. Specialising in a niche range of hydraulic and fluid system products has allowed us to offer some really innovative solutions to our customers. Maybe a conversation ends up with one of our massive range of Micropac hand pumps. Maybe the need is for a custom manifold integrated with standard parts will provide a very cost effective hand pump that a customer will “own brand” and sell with their actuators, day surgery trolleys, fire misting systems or a myriad of other applications. Or we are able to add fluid system components to one of our pumps to meet that special need.

Thank you John!

Karim visited Swagelok Bristol in April this year. He was here to support some of our customers and we took the opportunity to ask him some questions about his role.

Karim, what's your background? 

I have worked with Swagelok for the last 13 years. I am responsible for growing sales of all existing AI products as well as strategic development of future growth initiatives in this key product segment, including annual business planning and product/technology road maps. My responsibilities as a product manager include developing products through market research then combining those findings with general requirements, specifications, timetables, pricing and plans to complete development and marketing strategies. My focus is aligning Swagelok with customer needs and addressing the significant trends facing our customers in the Analytical space to help increase their asset operational efficiency in a safe, reliable, & cost-effective manner. 

What are you currently working on? 

I am working on expanding Swagelok's application solutions to provide customers with an entire set of solutions to their most demanding systems from the extraction of the sample up to their laboratory. 

Where was your last field trip? 

I travel extensively for my role, the last countries visited were within Europe, Prague, Germany, Sweden and now the UK. I support customers globally in my everyday role. 

How have you supported our customers here in the South West of England? 

Visiting customers allows me to align marketing and customer needs with my strategies and initiatives and the goal of becoming a complete solution provider. I identify common customer requirements around the globe and communicate these to Swagelok distributors to ensure Swagelok is continuously seeking to improve customers pain points. 

Tell me a success story! 

Koch – Ammonia sampler system. This was initially a bespoke project for a customer and now is a patented system. Our Ammonia Sampler is the only semi-automated system that is easy to install and operate limiting operator exposure and increasing process efficiency for our customers.

Do you focus on individual components or a holistic approach when reviewing a fluid system? 

A holistic approach, my approach has been to look for ways to understand and fulfill what matters to our customers. Each application are so unique and I always look at the big picture, focus on areas where our customers experience the most challenges and try to work with my team to create solutions that are fully customisable to help our customers maintain what matters most to them (safety, sustainability and their process efficiencies).

How many projects are you working on at one time? 

Currently 5 projects, the number always changes based on complexity and my level of involvement

How do customers get the opportunity to work with you? 

Through local distributor interactions, they engage with me for opportunities regarding these applications. 

(If you would like to work with a Swagelok Product Manager - Get in touch with Swagelok Bristol through the form below and we will start a conversation with the right product manager for your needs.)

What are the 3 most essential tools or systems you use to complete your projects? 

Voice of the customer, insight trips, market research and working with different service groups, operations, custom solutions and marketing. 

Tell me your product of the moment 

Analytical Instrumentation: measurement is a very important part of most customers businesses, for example in refinery and petrochemical processes, pressures to decrease downtime, minimize corrosion, and reduce waste and the use of chemicals has increased. The value of process analytics in these environments is substantial. We deal with measurement and control of various physical and chemical properties such as chemical composition, pH, density, viscosity, flash point, etc. My product line plays a very important role in various industries such as chem and refining, research laboratories, oil & gas refineries, research space, and food-processing laboratories. It also plays a critical role in enabling my customers monitoring of process conditions, product quality during custody transfer and control of environment emissions.

Swagelok Grab Sampling is one of our breadth of solutions that we offer that provides a means of capturing a representative sample. It is used in different markets and it is customisable to customer needs allowing for safe, efficient sample capturing.

....and finally, what do you think of this statement from the  

"IEEE Pulse of Engineering survey 2018" 

"Engineers are facing greater challenges and increased pressure in their profession. Seventy-nine percent agree or strongly agree that designs are more complex/sophisticated, 72 percent agree or strongly agree there are more time-to-market pressures, and 65 percent agree or strongly agree that design cycles are shrinking. " 

I agree. There is a general trend where time, speed and complexity are getting stringent. Customers want to do more with less. Automation is one aspect that is solving some of these issues. The above also ties into my intention to leverage the technology to enable our customers to have better visibility to their system parameters and become more predictive than preventative. 

Thank you Karim!

Would you like to learn more about Grab Sampling? Karim has written an article entitled 'Grab Sampling 101' use the links below to find out more.