Pace closed three US diecasting plants. Tier-2 buyers now wait 20 weeks for a casting.
Pace Industries, the largest diecasting network in North America, permanently shut three US aluminum diecasting plants in April 2026: Harrison, Arkansas; Muskegon, Michigan; and Jackson, Tennessee. Together those plants poured about 175,000 metric tons of castings a year and employed 382 skilled workers. The closures accelerated a slow-burn collapse the American Foundry Society (the US metalcasting trade body, known as AFS) has tracked for a decade. About 1,750 US foundries are left, down from several thousand a generation ago. Roughly 80 percent employ fewer than 100 people. Tier-2 manufacturers (the mid-sized firms that supply parts to the big assemblers) now wait 16 to 20 weeks for small-batch castings, and most US shops refuse jobs under one million dollars.
01The pain
Pace Industries told 382 workers in Harrison, Arkansas; Muskegon, Michigan; and Jackson, Tennessee that their aluminum diecasting plants would close in April 2026.1,2,3 The three plants together poured about 175,000 metric tons of castings a year, enough metal to anchor the small-volume side of North American supply for engine brackets, gear housings, pump bodies and switchgear parts. Pace ran the largest diecasting network on the continent. The buyers who relied on it now call around looking for anyone left who will accept a small run.
The shortage was building for a decade before Pace pulled the trigger. The American Foundry Society counts about 1,750 foundries left in the country, down from several thousand a generation ago.4 Around 80 percent of those survivors employ fewer than 100 people. The pourers, mold-makers and pattern-shop crews who learned the trade in the 1970s and 1980s are retiring. Few apprentices replaced them. Lead times on a small-batch sand or investment casting (orders of 200 to 50,000 pieces, often in steel or ductile iron rather than aluminum) now run 16 to 20 weeks at the foundries still taking work. Most US shops will not quote a job under one million dollars. Tier-2 manufacturers, the mid-sized firms that supply parts to the big assemblers, are shipping castings from China and waiting on the boat.5
Further reading
- 1 Foundry Management & Technology — reporting on the initial Pace Industries announcement to close two aluminum diecasting plants in April 2026, with job-loss counts and plant-by-plant capacity figures: foundrymag.com
- 2 Steel Market Update — March 2026 update covering Pace's expansion of the closure list to a third plant and the cumulative impact on US diecasting capacity: steelmarketupdate.com
- 3 Crain's Grand Rapids Business — local coverage of the Muskegon, Michigan plant closures and 145 of the 382 jobs lost in west Michigan: crainsgrandrapids.com
- 4 American Foundry Society — industry-impact data on the US metalcasting sector, including the ~1,750 active foundry count, employment mix, and small-shop share: afsinc.org
- 5 PR Newswire — MES Inc press release positioning its global sourcing network as the response for US manufacturers stranded by the Pace closures; useful as evidence that even adjacent vendors confirm domestic capacity has gone, not been replaced: prnewswire.com
02Who solves this today
We searched for a US company that runs the operating-business shape this gap calls for: a regional small-batch specialty foundry with 3D-printed sand molds, electric induction furnaces, an in-house apprenticeship academy and 200 to 50,000 piece runs in aluminum, steel and ductile iron, with engineering support for Tier-2 buyers. We searched in English and in trade-press for "new specialty foundry US 2025 2026", "small-batch investment casting US new company", "domestic foundry founder" and "3D sand printed mold foundry US startup", and worked through the adjacents named in the post-Pace coverage. The product-page results were:
- Kinetic Die Casting (Bell Gardens, California) runs a small zinc and aluminum die-cast shop focused on three-to-five-pound parts. The shop is real, but the scale and process mix do not cover the small-batch sand or investment casting tier Pace's closures stranded.
- MES Inc positioned itself in March 2026 as the response to the Pace closures — but its own press release describes a global sourcing network that routes US buyers to overseas foundries. It is a broker, not a foundry; it confirms the gap rather than fills it.
- Mackenzie Castings LLC (Arlington, Washington) is a roughly 15-person family business named in Practical Machinist threads as one of the last regional shops still taking small-batch work. It is a survivor, not a scalable national operating business, and its own staffing sits on the same retiring-pourer demographic curve as the rest of the sector.
- Single-owner job shops exist across the Midwest and the Southeast, but almost none have the 3D sand-printing capacity, the induction-melt depth, the apprentice pipeline or the engineering staff needed to take a 200 to 50,000 piece run on quote.
None of these is a regional small-batch specialty foundry at scale. This is an open opportunity for founders. The demand is concrete and recurring: Tier-2 manufacturers stranded by 175,000 metric tons of vanished domestic diecasting capacity, lead times of 16 to 20 weeks at the shops still pouring, refusal to quote jobs under one million dollars, and a workforce demographic that gets worse every retirement. What is missing is the operator: a team that pairs modern process technology (3D-printed sand molds, induction furnaces, casting-simulation software) with the unfashionable work of training new pourers, mold-makers and pattern-shop crews from scratch. If you build, or know, a company that actually runs this shape in the US, email contact@aikraft.com and we will list them.
No companies listed yet — get on this page. This page is in no-solver-yet mode: we could not find a US company whose product page concretely runs a regional small-batch specialty foundry with 3D-printed sand molds, induction furnaces, an in-house apprenticeship academy and 200 to 50,000 piece runs in aluminum, steel and ductile iron. If you build or know one, write to us and we will list them within 7 business days. If you are already listed elsewhere on bizpain.org and want a correction or removal, that runs through the same channel. Email contact@aikraft.com.
Operators discussing this
US machinists, fabricators and small-batch buyers have been writing about the disappearing domestic foundry on Practical Machinist for more than a decade. The three threads below trace the arc from 2014 through October 2025. They are the reason this page exists.
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«Less than a century ago, there were cast iron foundries serving the 'small' market in every major city, and cast steel foundries in more than a few. Today, very much harder to find.»
"Less than a century ago, there were cast iron foundries serving the 'small' market in every major city, and cast steel foundries in more than a few. Today, very much harder to find."
Practical Machinist — "Looking for recommendations for small production foundry" — Posted 6 October 2025, five distinct posters (PowderCoat, 4GSR, sfriedberg, dgfoster, L Vanice) on the opening day. The most recent leg of a multi-year arc of identical "where can I find a US foundry?" threads on the same board.
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«EPA has run many of the foundries out of business and those that are left are busy. All the old hands died or retired and little new blood went into foundry work.»
"EPA has run many of the foundries out of business and those that are left are busy. All the old hands died or retired and little new blood went into foundry work."
Practical Machinist — "Factories with foundries" — Posted February 2023, at least five distinct posters. The middle leg of the 2014 → 2023 → 2025 Practical Machinist recurrence on the same pain.
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«What happened to the people who could make a good casting?»
"What happened to the people who could make a good casting?"
Practical Machinist — "These castings scare me!!! What happened to the people who could make a good casting?" — Posted August 2014, eight distinct posters. The historical anchor that establishes the more-than-a-decade arc of US operator chatter on foundry workforce collapse.
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