The Heat Is On

Chromalox, The Inventor Of Electric Heating Technology, Keeps Global Industry Running At Peak Performance — And The Ideal Temperature.

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Thermal technology is the ultimate cool. Without complex process heating technology, the industrial world as we know it would come to an immediate and complete halt.

If this is your first exposure to Chromalox, the pioneering Pittsburgh stalwart founded by the inventor of electric heating technology, you might think it heats structures. Christopher Molnar, the firm’s VP of Global Product Marketing and Engineering, gets that a lot.

“People think we just keep buildings warm,” he told BOSS. “What they don’t understand is that we’re really a process heating technology provider, which means we install electric process heaters into every kind of fluid, air, gas, liquid — anything that’s flowing and moving in a customer’s manufacturing plant, whether to create chemical reactions, elevate process temperatures, or change physical properties. Companies can’t manufacture their end product without our technology being an integral part of that process.”

In 1915, seeking an alternative to the common but unreliable and dangerous “open coil” heat technology of the day, Edwin L. Wiegand developed a metal-sheathed resistance heating element that changed the course of industry. Wiegand’s work — initially done at his dining room table — triggered technological advancements that brought electric heating into every corner of life.

“We’ve been solving customer challenges for over 100 years,” Molnar noted. “We’ve solved heating issues on the moon and in space, in the ocean, in the air, on offshore oil platforms, at power plants, in refineries. Our solutions are installed in everything from commercial food equipment to commuter trains to beverage plants to molten salt energy storage systems and everything in between.”