On a cold January day in 1948, E.L. Faulman opened his first rack manufacturing plant in Paterson, New Jersey with 4 employees. Later that same year, just a mile or so away, Rackman was born to serve and protect the metal finishers of the world against the misfortunes of rack abuse and terrorist acts by evil rack designers.

In 1958, the company had expanded to 50 employees and three more plants located in Chicago, Los Angeles, and Springfield, Ohio. We presently we have 10 manufacturing locations and approximately 200 employees making ARC the largest manufacturer of metal finishing racks and fixtures in the United States and Canada. In 1998, we celebrated our 50th, Anniversary of proudly serving the Metal Finishing industries which is now under the leadership of Bill and Mike Faulman.

Over the years, ARC has been very innovative with rack designs. We were the first plating rack manufacturers to implement the use of PVC (Plastisol) as an insulator. The development of this process was parts of a joint venture between National Rack, General Electric, and Michigan Chrome. Our interest in PVC was obviously for plating racks and GE was looking for a coating for dishwasher racks. Prior to using PVC, plating racks were coated with liquid neoprene and cured in sunlight on the roof of the manufacturing plants. You could imagine what this would be like on a rainy day or in the depth of winter.

ARC was also the first to develop and patent the replaceable tip design for plating racks. This is an economical alternative to repairing broken or bent tips instead of rebuilding a complete rack. We also developed the one-piece cast tip and molded thumbscrews used in the printed circuit board industry which allows current reach both sides of the circuit board during the plating process.

ARC has always been a service-oriented company, which is why we have plants in 10 major manufacturing regions of the United States. Our Sales Engineers come to your facility to review your requirements so that we can custom design a rack which takes into consideration maximum productivity, minimal solution drag-out, and is ergonomically friendly.