Company history

The company began in the 1980's with a small portable propane fired preheater that Bob Reiff designed as a project for a design course while earning an MS-Engineering degree at the University of Wisconsin.  The professor entered it into a national design competition and it won an award for "excellence in engineering design" and "creative design".

Bob built and sold them as a side business while employed with a Fortune 500 company.  In 1992 we expanded into electric preheaters with the HotPad oil sump heaters.  They soon dominated the business so we dropped the propane heater to concentrate on improving and growing the line of electric systems.  In 1995 Bob quit his "day" job to devote full time to the preheater business.  In 1996 we introduced the innovative HotBand cylinder heating system, which can be used either independently or with any oil sump heater. In 2001 we introduced the metal HotStrip oil sump heater, and the Standard and Turbo Systems which integrated the HotBand and HotStrip heaters together.  In 2002 we introduced the Turbo XP System.  In 2004 the company moved to larger facilities to better accommodate our growth.  In 2008 we introduced the oil cooler heater option.

Other products are in development and we believe they will be equally well received by aircraft owners.

Bob is a long time member of AOPA and EAA. He has been a pilot and aircraft owner since 1978 and has built an RV-4 with a 180 hp Lycoming 360.  Since this aircraft is Experimental it serves as a test bed for developing new products.  We also own a Piper Cherokee 235 for travel.

The business continues to grow rapidly with about 20% average annual growth over the past 15 years.  We are very blessed and grateful that our customers have accepted our products, enabling us to combine our livelihood with our passion, aviation.   

Last updated 7/7/08