Precision Castparts Corp. (PCC) is a world-class, diversified manufacturer of highly engineered, complex metal components and products. Headquartered in Lake Oswego, Oregon, the company primarily serves the global aerospace, defense, power generation, and general industrial markets. Originally established in 1953 as a small investment casting business with just a handful of employees, PCC has grown into a dominant manufacturing force. In 2016, the corporation was acquired by Berkshire Hathaway, operating today as a wholly owned subsidiary.
PCC is the undisputed global market leader in manufacturing large, complex structural investment castings, airfoil castings, forged components, aerostructures, and critical, highly engineered fasteners. Known for handling extreme-tolerance metallurgy, the company's components are crucial to the assembly of modern commercial jetliners, military aircraft, industrial gas turbines, and deep-sea oil and gas installations.
Operating Structure & Key Divisions
Precision Castparts Corp. operates through a decentralized business model where each production facility is managed as its own performance-driven business unit. The corporation is structurally divided into four primary segments, each containing several specialized, market-leading subsidiaries:
1. Investment Cast Products
This division is the world leader in manufacturing high-quality, complex investment castings, including the world’s largest diameter investment cast components.
* PCC Structurals: Headquartered in Clackamas, Oregon, this unit specializes in superalloy, titanium, stainless steel, and aluminum investment castings. It manufactures massive components (up to 100 inches in diameter) for jet engines, airframes, and military armaments.
* PCC Airfoils: Manufactures highly critical "hot section" components for aircraft and industrial engines, including blades, vanes, shrouds, heat shields, and fairings.
2. Forged Products
PCC operates some of the most powerful forging facilities in existence, manufacturing complex forgings and high-performance alloys.
* Wyman-Gordon: A premier manufacturer of structural forgings, turbine discs, and pressure vessels for aerospace and energy markets. It operates massive equipment, including a 50,000-ton press in Grafton, Massachusetts, which exerts 100,000,000 pounds of pressure and extends ten stories underground.
* PCC Energy Group: Specializes in extruded seamless pipe, fittings, and specialized forgings for power plants and deep-sea oil platform applications.
3. Metals Products
This division encompasses more than 180 years of cumulative metallurgical experience, manufacturing advanced raw metals and alloys utilized by casting and forging facilities worldwide.
* Special Metals Corporation (SMC): The world leader in the invention and production of high-performance, nickel-based superalloys (including Inconel, Monel, and Nimonic) designed to withstand extreme heat, pressure, and corrosive environments.
* Titanium Metals Corporation (TIMET): One of the world's largest major producers of titanium melted and mill products, supporting the complete titanium supply chain from sponge processing to finished mill forms.
4. Airframe Products
Focuses on highly engineered fasteners, fastening systems, and integrated structural components.
* PCC Fasteners: Produces critical aerospace fasteners and high-volume cold-formed parts. To put their scale in perspective, it takes an average of 300,000 PCC-manufactured fasteners to assemble a single modern commercial aircraft.
* PCC Aerostructures: Manufactures mechanical flight control assemblies, latches, struts, fluid fittings, and structural airframe components.
Core Products and Services
PCC’s extensive capabilities allow it to supply end-to-end metallurgical solutions, starting from raw alloy development to final precision-machined assemblies.
1. Structural Investment Castings
PCC utilizes advanced investment casting (lost-wax casting) to produce complex, single-piece metal components that replace multi-part welded assemblies. This reduces weight and increases structural integrity.
* Aerospace Applications: Compressor rear frames, fan frames, diffusers, intermediate cases, and turbine exhaust cases.
* Industrial & Military Applications: Impellers, medical prosthetics, and critical structural components for the US Space Program.
2. Airfoils (Blades & Vanes)
Engines run at temperatures exceeding the melting point of the metals themselves, requiring highly specialized engineering.
* Directional Solidification (DS) & Single-Crystal (SX) Castings: Airfoil blades cast as a single crystal of nickel superalloy, completely eliminating grain boundaries to prevent creep deformation under extreme centrifugal force and heat.
* Cooling Passages: Complex internal cooling channels cast directly into blades and vanes to allow cooling air to flow through the component during engine operation.
3. Forged Components
Rotary & Disc Forgings: High-integrity turbine discs, fan discs, and shafts for jet engines.
Extruded Pipe: Heavy-wall, seamless extruded pipes designed for high-temperature, high-pressure steam lines in power generation plants.
4. Engineered Fasteners & Precision Parts
Threaded Fasteners & Bolts: High-strength, corrosion-resistant bolts, nuts, and pins made from titanium and nickel-base alloys for critical aerospace joint connections.
Fluid Fittings & Latches: Quick-disconnect fluid fittings and structurally sound latching systems for aircraft doors and access panels.
Value-Added Industrial Services
To complement its massive manufacturing footprint, PCC offers specialized technical and secondary processing services:
Solidification Modeling & Rapid Prototyping: Utilizing computer-aided solidification modeling and stereolithography (SLA) to optimize mold designs before casting begins.
Hot Isostatic Pressing (HIP): Subjecting castings to high temperatures and isostatic gas pressure to eliminate internal porosity, significantly increasing fatigue life.
Advanced Testing & Diagnostics: In-house capabilities including digital radiography, ultrasonic testing, and destructive metallurgical analysis to guarantee defect-free components.
Revert Metal Processing: Processing and recycling high-value metal scrap and turnings ("revert") back into the manufacturing cycle to minimize material waste and maintain cost-efficiency.
Please note: This information is generated by AI. For legal use, verify with company sources.
