WESTON, WI – January 9, 2019: As an engineering and manufacturing company, CTech has earned the respect of a wide range of industries for not just providing the highest-quality storage products and services, but for injecting fresh innovation to storage products that have been in service for centuries. Our approach has allowed us to work with other industry leaders such as Caterpillar, Ford, Knapheide, Chevy, Norfolk Southern, NFL, PGA, NASCAR, U.S. Military, and many others. As the world relies more on the concept of efficiency than ever, CTech remains committed to leading the storage industry in engineering long-lasting storage products that keep up with the rest of society’s technology. Moving into our second quarter-century of business, our goal is uncompromising; to provide better products, faster, and with better service than any other manufacturer in the storage industry.

Unlike any other manufacturer in the storage industry, CTech products are a top-tier choice for both mobile and stationary applications. Our company roots begin in Jim Greenheck’s race trailer. Like many other Motorsport enthusiasts, Jim needs to haul a large amount of equipment from event to event. From nuts and bolts to spare transmissions and drag tires, everything that needs to be brought to the drag strip must also be stored and organized in the trailer. Of course, you can only haul so many pounds/kilograms of material on your trailer, storage system included. Thus, it was decided that Jim’s first trailer cabinet was going to be made of aluminum. 5052 aluminum, an aerospace-grade material, continues to be the base stock for all CTech products. Its strength, and most importantly, it is lightweight, making it the perfect material for mobile applications.

 

 

The next engineering marvel Jim had to tackle was the actual construction of his new trailer cabinet system. Traditional metal storage systems are assembled via welding. Welding results in a rigid storage system, highly susceptible to fracturing over time through rough travel. When that happens, the entire storage system must be replaced, which is costly and inconvenient. Jim realized that this wasn’t the method he was going to use to create his dependable trailer cabinets. Hence, the next revolution in CTech product development was the introduction of fastener construction. Building CTech cabinets with fasteners gave the storage system just enough ‘flexibility’ to survive rough travel while fully loaded, and also provided the bonus of being able to easily replace individual panels and assemblies of the system in case of incidental damage.

 

 

With CTech trailer cabinets quickly taking shape, the next innovation to be introduced was the MotionLatch™ drawer handle. Drawers and cabinet doors that are installed in mobile applications must remain securely latched while not in use; otherwise, they’ll fly open and unleash whatever contents that were stored in them. Here’s the catch; those drawers and doors must also be easily accessible by the user at a moment’s notice—the more accessible, the better. MotionLatch drawer and door handles were engineered with a dual-latch design to keep stored items secure during transit. The handle itself provides a full-width area on the drawer/door front for the user to access and the best part; the user has to take no extra steps to “unlock” or “unlatch” the drawer or door. Just pull anywhere on the drawer face, and you’ve gained access to stored items. Since the introduction of MotionLatch technology, many other companies have attempted to copy the design. Still, none have been able to duplicate the superior accessibility and durability that MotionLatch doors and drawers provide. A funny story behind the origin of the full-width extrusion is, Jim, put on a welding glove and filled his hand with tools and said I need the handle to work in these conditions.

 

 

With Jim’s new trailer cabinet solution already proving to be a step above the competition, further innovations were introduced, including Adjust-A-Loc shelves. Traditional cabinet shelving utilizes ‘floating’ shelves that are held up only with pins inserted into the cabinet assembly. In a mobile application, this would fail to keep the shelf and its stored items from shifting around during transit. CTech’s Adjust-A-Loc technology utilizes small clips that securely fasten the shelf to the cabinet chassis, preventing it from moving up/down and left/right. The clips can be removed with a single bolt and adjusted at 1” increments along the cabinet walls to adjust the height of the self itself, ensuring that the cabinet system can easily adapt to changing storage needs. Thanks to this innovation, Jim’s shelves wouldn’t be jumping and moving all over the place on his way to the drag strip, and his stored items would be much more secure as a result.

 

 

Anyone who’s tried to maneuver around the tight space in a fully-packed trailer has probably bumped a knee, head, or elbow or two. Cabinet bases and overhead units are then “just another thing to run into” on accident while your maneuvering in a trailer. To eliminate this, CTech introduced the Radius-Edge cabinet ends. The rounded corners on our Ultra Series cabinets essentially get rid of the hard, sharp corners that would be left on a traditional cabinet unit. This innovation also provided a sleek, aesthetic look to the cabinet unit that has lead to our cabinets being used in many showrooms and design-inspired areas. Form and function both improved thanks to CTech engineering!

 

 

The culmination of all this innovative thinking was a trailer cabinet system that was so far advanced compared to anything else on the market that CTech Mfg. was formed to carry that same spirit to many other forms of storage. Pit carts were the next storage system to be revolutionized by CTech. This product line has since become a massive part of the brand and has developed alongside the motorsport industry to support championship-winning race teams. MotionLatch technology was found to be so revolutionary that an entire product line was devoted to merely manufacturing drawer units to go inside service trucks and other applications. Tactical storage units are the most recent storage domain to be revolutionized by CTech. With the introduction of CopBox tactical storage cabinets, trunk storage for law enforcement and emergency response professionals has never been so easy, dependable, and efficient.

As we begin our second quarter-century of storage innovation, we’re better prepared than ever to continue providing the best-of-the-best in products and services for our customers. Our manufacturing potential is mightier than ever with our recent 80,000 square foot expansion, and our newly-commissioned Research & Development center will allow us to bring further storage solution innovations to you!