News & Press Releases

While recognizing that emerging from the wash bay with a clean vehicle is the driver’s No. 1 expectation, a close second in determining whether or not that driver becomes a repeat customer is delivering a pleasurable wash experience. To that end, PDQ Manufacturing, Inc., a product brand of OPW Vehicle Wash Solutions, strives to engineer systems that can create the ideal touchless wash experience for the customer. This commitment is epitomized by its LaserWash® 360 Plus wash system.

Developers of innovative new products or systems are understandably proud. It is the truly trendsetting developers, however, that immediately begin to look for ways to make their new product even better. In this vein, Belanger, Inc., a product brand of OPW Vehicle Wash Solutions, has made many significant improvements over recent decades in the wash media used in conjunction with its wash systems.

While ethylene oxide (EO) is a basic compound in many commonly used products, it can be quite volatile. This colorless gas is flammable and highly reactive, and acute exposure to EO can lead to severe health hazards. These characteristics and their potential risks to humans and the environment requires EO to be handled with the utmost care during transport, much of which is performed via pressurized railcar.

A key link in the LPG production and supply chain are the railroads that transport the fuel to all points of the compass in the U.S. In fact, the 120-car LPG-laden unit trains passing through communities large and small across the country have become so ubiquitous that they have essentially become ambient noise.

Belanger is proud to announce its Cube® Soft-Touch In-Bay Automatic Wash System has been named the winner in the Car Wash/Forecourt category of CSP magazine’s 17th Annual Retailer Choice Best New Product Contest. The winners of the contest, which honors the convenience-store industry’s most successful product launches from the past year, are chosen via an online poll of c-store retailers.

OPW, a Dover company and a global leader in fluid-handling solutions, announced today that is has acquired the ISO Liquid Tank Container product line from Girard Equipment, Inc., of Vero Beach, FL. Going forward, OPW will manufacture the ISO Liquid Tank Container product line at OPW’s facility in Lianyungang City, Jiangsu Province, China, with emphasis on increasing OPW’s presence and product portfolio in the Asia-Pacific, Latin American and European regions.

A lot of time, thought and effort is needed when identifying a solution that optimizes terminal operations. In the following article, OPW Engineered Systems Director of Sales, David Morrow, discusses the importance of choosing the right Loading Arm System for a specific application.

Civacon, a world leader in truck tank components and systems, has announced that it will host a series of virtual sessions to provide education on the benefits, use cases and features of digital truck tank interfaces, an evolution from traditional analog, mechanical controls. Those interested are invited to register for the Civacon Virtual Seminar starting September 15 for access to this series of videos as well as a live Q&A session.

It may be patently obvious, but it’s worth bearing in mind – water is the lifeblood of the vehicle-wash industry. Without its ready availability, professional washes would cease to function. That’s why savvy wash operators know that they must treat their most precious resource with as much tender loving care as a conscientious car owner lavishes on a vehicle.

At first glance, it would seem that marketing a tunnel car wash would be pretty basic, with little room for differentiation: dirty vehicles go in, clean ones come out. In reality, the wash operators who look beyond that rather simplistic formula are the ones that can create a truly memorable wash experience that will help them succeed.

There are inherent risks that must be analyzed and mitigated when transporting liquefied petroleum gas, or LPG, via railcar. Perhaps the most “noteworthy” or “fear-inducing” risk in transporting LPG is the potential for deadly fires and explosions that can result during an accident or non-accidental release (NAR) incident that includes a breach in product containment.

It’s an unavoidable fact of railroad life that at some point, most unit trains – which can be 100 cars or longer – will pass through a heavily populated urban area while laden with dangerous or hazardous materials. While accidents that result in catastrophic leaks or spills of hazardous materials are extremely rare – and becoming even rarer, according to industry analysts – a rollover incident that occurs in an urban, population-dense area has the potential to adversely affect a large number of people.

Tunnel washes continue to forge ahead and have made a comfortable home for themselves in the vehicle-wash universe. Since 1969, Belanger, Inc., has been a leader in developing innovative tunnel-wash designs that are able to deliver a better wash experience for the customer and the highest level of reliability, durability and serviceability for the operator.

At first glance, fueling systems at retail fueling sites appear to be nothing more than rough-and-tumble setups – a big hole is dug in which a long tube is buried before a heavy-duty pump pushes the fuel through the dispenser nozzle and into a customer’s vehicle. In reality, they are delicate ecosystems in which a number of finely tuned parts need to function in harmony to consistently produce the desired result.

OPW’s 125-year-plus commitment to providing one of the safest, most reliable and most efficient storage-terminal loading-arm technologies has rightfully positioned it as one of the acknowledged leaders in the field. The latest manifestation of its expertise in this realm came in 2019 when the company announced that it had performed a top-to-bottom reimagining of its loading-arm business, with the creation of three distinct OPW Engineered Systems loading-arm families: StandardLine, ProLine and CustomLine.

There are several critical points in the fuel-delivery process at a retail or commercial fueling site: ensuring the correct type or grade of fuel is unloaded into the correct tank, ensuring the entire payload is unloaded, ensuring correct volumes are delivered and avoiding product overfills are among the most common. While errors can be rare, they are also entirely unacceptable.

In the fluid storage terminal industry, hundreds of product-transfer activities that take place on any given day carry with them the built-in risk of a product release occurring. Product releases, especially if the fluid product is deemed dangerous or hazardous, cannot be tolerated in any form or volume because they can cause injury to those administering the transfer process, along with damage to our environment.

Per its mission to protect people and the environment while also enhancing business performance, Midland Manufacturing developed a Pressure Relief Valve (PRV) pursuant to the DOT-117/TC-117 regulation.

With all of the varying characteristics that need to be analyzed for loading arm systems, it can be hard to find a “one size fits all” solution that the bulk-terminal operator will be comfortable installing and using. It is at this point that the flexibility that is offered by customization enters the picture.

The members of the engineering team at OPW Engineered Systems like nothing more than packing up their measuring and surveying tools and heading out to a bulk-plant or terminal site where they can begin the process of designing and creating yet another best-in-class solution for a difficult fluid-handling challenge. Since March, “work-from-home” has become the new normal – at least for the near future.