By Shea Gibbs, Senior Editor

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Deere Waterloo's automated robotic melting system performs the melt deck tasks that formerly were done by operators in close proximity to the molten metal.

The metalcaster takes safety seriously, so the pre-tour ritual—whether you’re a lowly magazine reporter or the prince of England—requires a full donning of personal protective equipment (PPE). First, kick off your shoes and pull on a pair of metatarsal-guarding steel toed boots. Next, cinch up the strap to a hard hat and pull it on above your protective goggles. Insert a pair of earplugs, slide your hands into a set of leather and you’re ready to hit the shop floor. But, if you’d like to visit the melt deck of the sprawling Deere Waterloo metalcasting plant (and you should: it’s the current crown jewel of the facility), you’ll also have to climb into a one-piece set of coveralls.

The get-up isn’t uncomfortable, but it takes some time to put it on. And while Deere Waterloo likes the safety improvements the PPE has afforded the metalcasting facility, it would like to keep the list of necessary apparel from growing. First and foremost, the company wants to engineer its way around safety concerns.

It is that eye for stemming safety hotspots before they spread that in large part led to Deere Waterloo’s latest metalcasting facility improvements, a multi-million-dollar melt deck revitalization that has put a new melting furnace on the floor, as well as the robotic hardware required to run all four of its furnaces from a distance. With the upgrade, the company effectively increased its melting capacity and efficiency to the level required for production, while at the same time making the company a safer place to work.