RIDGLOK by MC&I Inc
Built with our custom Vertical Standing Seam Panel Insulation technology, RIDGLOK® Tank Insulation Systems are available in a variety of insulation and metal options to serve your engineering specifications. RIDGLOK® Panels are a long term solution for preventing energy waste with a low maintenance, high wind speed design. MC&I, the manufacturer of the RIDGLOK® brand, is a family owned business located in Reed, KY. What makes MC&I better is not just the RIDGLOK® product, but how we serve you with our product. Things that bother our customers, bother us. If there’s a problem, it matters – and it affects our reputation.
Company details
Find locations served, office locations
- Business Type:
- Manufacturer
- Industry Type:
- Water Storage
- Market Focus:
- Nationally (across the country)
This company also provides solutions for other industrial applications.
Please, visit the following links for more info:
About Us
But why should you care?
That’s a fair question that belongs on every ABOUT page.
Well, being a family owned business means that we care deeply about our reputation. The company name MC&I derives from Mayes Coatings & Insulation.
Bob Mayes, the founder and owner of MC&I, learned a long time ago that a company’s reputation is intertwined with how the company meets its customers’ expectations.
MC&I gives personal attention to every project. They monitor and manage expectations by:
- asking lots of questions
- staying in contact
- providing clear documentation during the course of a project
- requiring installation photos at all key stages
- not leaving the installation until they receive a favorable sign-off
You don’t make a great product first try, and even when you feel your product is perfect you must continue to find ways to improve it by:
- making it more reliable
- improving the design
- finding higher quality suppliers
- finding ways to buy more competitively
- searching for efficiencies at every step of the process from vendor selection to managing materials on a jobsite
- creating a process to educate installers so they can work with speed and quality
- educating designers on when to specify the product
- having a hotline for installers to get immediate advice during installation
- providing immediate and thorough customer service
- ensuring 100% on-time delivery
- adapting to the needs of customers – like filling orders with short lead-times
- arranging delivery and unloading
- coordinating your installation behind the scenes with tank manufacturers and sub-contractors so you don’t have to
- conducting long-term tests of materials
- constantly educating themselves with changing technology
- lifting the industry by contributing articles to international magazines
- listening, learning, adapting, improving at every opportunity
- believing that competition keeps us honest and provides opportunities to better serve our customers
What makes MC&I better is not just the RIDGLOK® product, but how we serve you with our product.
Things that bother our customers, bother us. If there’s a problem, it matters – and it affects our reputation.
In cases where we’ve encountered a dissatisfied customer (anyone who says they haven’t is probably not the most truthful person you ever met) we put two steps into immediate action:
- Fix the problem for the customer so they’re ‘NEW’ again
- Revise our process and re-educate the team to prevent the issue from happening to others.
If there’s a problem, we’re not going to merely fix it – that goes without saying . . . We’re going to fix our process to ensure it doesn’t happen to others.
Our business is built on giving our customers what they want and expect. That’s how we maintain our reputation. It’s important for anyone doing business with us to know that their concerns matter.
The WHY behind MC&I
After years of painting, applying spray foam insulation, and installing conventional tank insulation, MC&I owner Bob Mayes could see that vertical laminated insulation panels were the future for the tank industry.
With the benefit of hindsight, he saw first-hand the many maintenance and durability headaches associated with insulating outdoor storage tanks with foam and conventional insulation.
Spray foam insulation must be monitored continually
Not just for damage, from weather, birds, and pests – but also for evidence of CUI (corrosion under insulation.) The foam insulation systems require continuous maintenance in the form of repainting and repairs of pits and holes.
Conventional insulation with its exterior fastening system suffers
From weathering and leaking at its exposed external fasteners, water and ice inevitably make their way through screw connections and seams. If the external tensioning bands aren’t checked for loosening from expansion, contraction and wind, broken seals introduce a path for moisture to penetrate the insulation system.
Over time, many conventional tank insulation systems buckle.
If mineral wool insulation is used, water infiltration at the buckled areas is wicked up and causes the insulation to sag and lose its insulative properties. The vertical weight of the panels inevitably fails.
These often-specified systems are good for the insulation business, but bad for the end user.
Bob didn’t want to associate his name or reputation with systems that repeatedly disappoint the end-users.
He decided to manufacture vertical standing seam insulation panels in which:
- All structural connections are internal and protected from weather by a double-fold standing seam – meaning that the seam is folded ‘twice’ to ensure a strong water-tight connection.
- A non-wicking rigid polyisocyanurate insulation is used (unless required otherwise by extreme temperatures). This hydrophobic insulation has proven the best balance between high thermal protection, low water absorption, and panel strength. If the panels are ever damaged physically and moisture does find its way in, it simply works its way to the bottom of the panel and out of the system.
- Even if deluged with water, the polyiso recovers 98% of its insulative properties as soon as the water recedes. Once it’s dry, it recovers the full 100%.
- The design creates massive savings during installation.
Panels are manufactured to a length that matches the height of the tank*. Instead of using costly scaffolding, each panel is usually installed with a single man-lift and two to three laborers. (*Panel length is limited to a maximum of 48ft. due to transportation restrictions. For taller tanks, panels are staggered at the 48ft and 80ft levels.) - The system lifespan is measured in decades. The RIDGLOK® system is expected to last 25 years or MORE.
- Minimal maintenance is required. When the polyisocyanurate insulation is used, maintenance amounts to occasionally checking and caulking penetrations of the system (like stair mounting angles and around manways).
MC&I continued to improve the system
Finding easier and faster techniques for installation that produced greater reliability and required fewer tools.
Then he introduced a training service at the manufacturing facility, so owners and contractors could visit and benefit from his insights on how to properly apply the system safely and efficiently. Although subcontractors are sometimes wary of doing their first install, they are thrilled with the process thereafter.
Although the system seems as close to perfect as possible, MC&I continually seeks out ways to make the product more economical while improving quality and consistency.
