Robert Hunter Accidents Will Happen, But Innovative Dent Puller Can Hide The Evidence

It’s a big ol’ dented world, and Robert Hunter couldn’t be happier.

The president of Automotive Repair Corp. says equipment made by the Airway Heights company can take the benders out of fenders and the folds out of frames better than anything else on the market.

A.R.C., with about a dozen employees, shipped 2,000 of the machines last year, Hunter said. The sales pace is accelerating as its distributor network reaches into new markets.

“I believe our equipment will be the device in every body shop,” he said.

Hunter had retired after a long career in chemical engineering when he founded A.R.C. in December 1994. The company’s primary product is a line of unique dent-pullers.

In conventional bodyshops, workmen drill holes in a smashed panel to pull out the dent as much as possible. The remaining depressions are restored with filler, then paint is applied.

With the A.R.C. equipment, which sells for $795 to $1,350, the puller is a handle-mounted electrode that is spot-welded onto the panel. Force is applied by hand or using a small lever.

The bond between panel and electrode is broken with a simple twist of the handle. No body filler is needed because there are no holes, and multiple welds combined with a heat-shrinking tip that relaxes stressed metal leave a grinder-ready surface.

“You just buff,” said Hunter in a quick demonstration.

He said results are so good General Motors has installed the devices at its Arlington, Texas, assembly line. Damaged panels are repaired on the spot and shipped to the paint shop, bypassing the body shop, he said.

Hunter estimated a typical dent can be repaired in one-third the time required by traditional methods.

Three of the four dent-pullers in the A.R.C. line are battery-powered. Hunter said that attribute has been critical to the company’s success because it makes the machines portable.

Similar machines requiring 220-volt circuitry proved impractical because repair shops did not have enough electrical outlets with the proper current.

Hunter was a passive investor in the company, now defunct, that produced the early machines. He and other investors bought some of the tooling from that business, shifted to the battery design - now patented - and started A.R.C.

The company also sells a frame-puller overseas but - unlike the dent-pullers - that equipment is not made in Spokane. Hunter said that may change as volume builds.

Hunter, who spent several years in South America building and operating multimillion-dollar plants for Celanese Corp., said he expects half of A.R.C.’s 1996 sales will be made overseas despite aggressive expansion plans in the United States.

A week ago, workers were preparing machines for shipment to China, Portugal and Sweden, one of the European countries that does not allow mangled cars on its roads.

Hunter said A.R.C. has approached the more sophisticated markets carefully. A few inferior components from outside suppliers tainted early shipments, he said, and the company does not want a repeat of those quality problems.

Most parts for the puller are made in-house, with nearby companies doing some sheet-metal and powder-coating work.

Hunter said as many as six workers may be assembling machines at any one time, with an equal number handling sales and administrative duties.

That includes two of his daughters and their husbands. Hunter said bringing family members into the business has been one of the rewards of running A.R.C. But he added that, though small, “We run it exactly like I would a Celanese company.”

Hunter, a University of Washington graduate in chemical engineering, also worked for Rayonier Corp. as a pulp and paper engineer before joining Celanese, a maker of synthetic fibers.

He retired in Spokane because his wife, Betty Ann, is a native of the area.

“You can do business here as good as any place in the world,” Hunter said.

His retirement cut short, he said he will keep his administrative duties but hand off responsibility for domestic marketing soon.

Once a network of about 200 distributors and dealers is in place, A.R.C. will introduce new products every six months, he said.

With auto repair near the top of the list for businesses with global growth potential, Hunter said, “You never know how big you’re going to be.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo