How RACI’s Casing Spacers Help Municipalities Protect Their Pipes

How RACI’s Casing Spacers Help Municipalities Protect Their Pipes

Installing and ensuring the longevity of pipes is a fundamental challenge for municipal water entities. RACI’s casing spacers allow pipes to be installed and secured in place with zero metal bolts, clamps, or other parts that will inevitably fail, thus increasing pipe longevity and allowing for easier installation. In this interview, Josef Reschreiter of RACI and Brad Mehalko of Public Works Products, Inc. (PWP), tell Municipal Water Leader about the advantages of RACI spacers and how the company is seeking to expand its reach across North America.

Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about your backgrounds and how you came to be in your current positions.

Josef Reschreiter: RACI started producing spacers in the 1960s and is now a global company. I started working in the distribution of RACI spacers about 31 years ago, focusing on the North and South American markets. We’ve since developed specific product lines for the U.S. market. We can accommodate all the different casing sizes, pipe diameters, and pipe types, which has been well received by our valued customers. I have been closely working with PWP since 1994, and it has been a long and rewarding journey. Over the years, we’ve developed strong friendships and relationships, and everything we do is built on mutual trust. Our word is our bond. In 2020, we had fresh blood come to PWP when Scott Ferguson and Brad Mehalko purchased the company and took over its management. They are doing an amazing job expanding to various different parts of the United States that had not been covered efficiently until now.

Brad Mehalko: My story is a little different than Josef ’s. I grew up in southern Alberta, Canada, and had the privilege of playing professional hockey until the age of 32, which afforded me the opportunity to live and work all over the United States, Norway, Finland, and Germany. When I decided to hang up my skates, I transitioned into the energy sector and held various positions in the oil and gas industry over 12 years. In late 2020, I was presented with the amazing business opportunity of joining a group of ambitious, like-minded individuals to purchase PWP, which was then known as Public Works Marketing. PWP has been the exclusive master distributor of RACI casing spacers for 27 years and has built a great book of business over the years. Every day, we learn more about the business and see the value of the great connections that have been forged over 27 years of operations. We have a great working and personal relationship with Josef and RACI and are still the exclusive master distributor of RACI casing spacers in the United States and Mexico. Since the purchase, we have done some rebranding, made necessary changes, and freshened up an old, sleepy business. We truly feel we are now poised to have a strong presence across the United States and Mexico and aim to continue to service our valued clients for many years to come.

RACI casing spacers.

Municipal Water Leader: Who are RACI’s customers?

Brad Mehalko: On the water and sewer side, our customer base includes but is not limited to municipalities, counties, boring and construction contractors, installers, wholesalers, and engineering groups. Some of the applications we commonly see are dual-containment drainage projects for airports and large car lots and dual-containment systems and oil and gas applications for transmission and distribution pipelines. RACI’s environmentally friendly, pure high-density polyethylene (HDPE) casing spacer provides an exact and educated solution for everything from everyday applications to the most challenging of jobs. Over the course of 60 years of executing projects in the field, we have had zero reported failures—zero!

Josef Reschreiter: Our customers also include the engineering departments of large municipalities, which use our products for municipal water and sewer lines, from those with diameters of 2, 4, or 6 inches all the way up to those of 140 inches. Our product can go into sewer lines, storm drains, dual containment applications (e.g., airport drainage applications), and anywhere else there is a pipe inside a pipe or a cased crossing. That’s where our product is best in class. We also supply the oil and gas market, where we are seen as a pipeline safety product for transmission and distribution lines.

Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about the installation process.

Josef Reschreiter: The installation process is modern, safe, and worry free. The installer simply joins the individual spacer segments together to complete the spacer ring or band. Each spacer has a male and a female toothed end that simply ratchet together. That simplicity is one of the principles of the RACI spacer. There are no bolts to attach and no wedges or additional parts that can be dropped or lost or that can break or fail. RACI spacers are designed to outlast the lifespan of the pipe.

Municipal Water Leader: What is distinctive about RACI’s casing spacers?

Josef Reschreiter: To ensure that we have protection all around the carrier pipe, we specify one projection for every inch of pipe diameter. It is important to note that longer casings made by boring equipment are not necessarily always straight and can even go up and down or snake left and right. When the carrier pipe is inserted, RACI spacers not only protect the bottom of the pipe, but also the sides and the top, as there can be contact with the casing all around the pipe during installation. In many installations, the carrier pipe also tends to slowly rotate during insertion, so it is imperative to have equal protection around all 360 degrees of the pipe’s diameter, with at least one projection for every inch of pipe diameter.

Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about the engineering support that RACI provides.

Josef Reschreiter: On average, every 20th inquiry includes some need for engineering support. We have a central engineering office, and we have an engineering team that works with the specifiers to give them as much support as they need to specify the casing and carrier size and the safe load-carrying capacity of the RACI casing spacer so that they can use them confidently and have the most costeffective installation.

Each individual model and type of RACI spacer is specified with exact load-carrying capacities, based on actual testing and long-term exposure. Our RACI brochure includes all the specifications and load-carrying data, and when we come across specific engineering needs or concerns, we can help address any questions or concerns with the backing of our dedicated engineering team. This will ensure that the installation is done per specification with a successful outcome. We will provide engineering drawings and make recommendations for the type of spacer, the runner heights, and the installation criteria, giving the installers confidence and peace of mind.

In the last couple of months, one of our clients was going to put a carrier pipe into a large-diameter steel casing. The client wanted to run an additional pipe on top of the carrier pipe along with a fiber-optic cable. We had our engineers take a look at it, and we came up with the solution of using a slightly taller spacer and placing the conduit for the fiber-optic cable inside the runners, allowing the client to significantly reduce its overall steel casing size, resulting in major cost savings. In fact, the savings are greater than the total cost of the spacers. Our engineering expertise can significantly improve a project or reduce costs. Engineering companies and municipalities love us because we can provide all the necessary details.

Municipal Water Leader: Please tell us about PWP’s expansion of its warehousing capacity.

Brad Mehalko: We have the ability to effectively service all of the United States and Mexico at this point, but we understand that with significant growth in sales comes the need for a larger footprint. Ideally, we will grow into warehouses on the West and East Coasts of the United States, complementing our current Dallas, Texas, headquarters and ensuring we efficiently and effectively maintain and service the growing needs of our clients. We are actively seeking qualified sales teams across the United States that have a strong desire to be a part of our growth.

Josef Reschreiter: Since new management has come to PWP, we’ve already seen significant increases in sales volumes and inquiries. However, in order to meet that growth, there has to be more inventory to ensure that we can continue PWP’s next-day or 2‐day shipment policy and its high quality of service in all corners of the United States.

Josef Reschreiter is the president and CEO of RACI Spacers North America, Inc.

Brad Mehalko is the vice president and coowner of Public Works Products, Inc. He can be reached at sales@pwp-co.com or (214) 340‐4226. For more about PWP, visit www.publicworksproducts.com.