The\u00a0founder Efisio Carutti<\/strong>\u00a0served in the First World War as Captain of the 3rd Motor Vehicle Fleet. He would often repeat with resentment that one of the reasons the Italians lost in Caporetto was because \u2018his\u2019 FIAT 15TER trucks, which were supposed to supply the front lines with ammunition, failed to get there because of faulty insulation in the Magneti Marelli coil of their engines. He would sarcastically remark that it is difficult to win when your cannons have no ammunition...\u00a0After the war, <\/strong>he opened the first<\/strong> \u2014 and at that time the only <\/strong>\u2014 car spare parts shop <\/strong>in Milan at Via Durini 31: \u2018De Martini Carutti & Gallotti\u2019. The shop was later expanded for the exclusive sale in Lombardy of the first Italian economy car, the famous \u2018TEMPERINO<\/strong>\u2019. Nino Farina, who went on to become a F1 champion in the 1950s, was one of the first to drive this car. Efisio\u2019s lack of \u2018sympathy\u2019 for the fascist party drove him into forced exile in 1933, during which he followed his brother Eugenio to Russia for the rest of the 1930s for the sale of CAPRONI<\/strong>\u00a0bombers and seaplanes by SAVOIA-MARCHETTI<\/strong>, of which Eugenio was the director. It was in Russia that he had the good fortune of meeting the engineer<\/strong> Armando\u00a0Fiorelli<\/strong>,\u00a0one of FIAT\u2019s<\/strong>\u00a0representatives abroad and part of FIAT in general for years, who oversaw the establishment of the FIAT factories in Poland, Togliatti in Russia, Bursa in Turkey, ZCZ in Yugoslavia, Concord in Argentina and SIMCA, of which he was president, etc. This encounter, which blossomed into a wonderful friendship, would be of great help to Carlo Alberto many years later, enabling him to get into FIAT with SPIERTZ presses and AICHELIN furnaces in the 1960s.<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
READ MORE<\/h5>\n\t\t\t\tOn his return to Italy in 1939<\/span><\/strong>, with a visa obtained laboriously by his wife, Efisio founded the company<\/strong> with a pioneering vision in machine tools sales. The groundwork and plans<\/strong> devised<\/strong> and set in place at the outset by Efisio kick-started the company\u2019s growth<\/strong>. The companies represented were mainly French or Belgian firms that no longer exist in the machine tools industry, such as Ernault-Batignolles<\/strong>\u00a0(copying lathes) sold for example to Rocco BORMIOLI to make the moulds for Coca-Cola bottles, Gambin<\/strong>\u00a0(milling machines), GSP<\/strong>\u00a0(radial drills) and\u00a0SPM<\/strong>\u00a0(high-speed lathes). Efisio served in the Second World War with the rank of major of the 3rd Army, as the leader of the Central and Northern Italy automobile fleet, in charge of requisitioning cars and vehicles that might be of use to the army. The apartment in Via Boccaccio in Milan was requisitioned by TELEMECCANICA\u00a0<\/strong>and SILURIFICIO ITALIANO<\/strong>. Efisio\u2019s wife, Maria, with their son Carlo Alberto only \u2014 their other son Gianni was at the front, in charge of a coastal battery in Dalmatia \u2014 was forced to leave for Azzate in the province of Varese, where she stayed at a friends\u2019 villa: the Villa of the Castellani counts. And it was there, in hiding, that Carlo Alberto had as his private tutor<\/strong> the university professor\u00a0Amintore<\/strong>\u00a0Fanfani<\/strong>, who would go on to become Italy\u2019s\u00a0prime<\/strong>\u00a0minister<\/strong>. Fanfani had also been evacuated with his wife to the same villa, where one of his daughters was born. With his private tutoring, Carlo Alberto was able not to miss years of classical high school and even managed to do two years in one, obtaining the classical high school diploma one year early. In 1944, the Republic of Sal\u00f2, also known as the Italian Social Republic, introduced the death penalty for people in hiding or anyone hiding to \u2018skip\u2019 their mandatory military service. However,\u00a0Carlo<\/strong>\u00a0Alberto<\/strong>\u00a0managed to get away with it: no one found him, even though it would seem that some people in the town knew. At the age of 23, he graduated<\/strong> from Politecnico<\/strong>\u00a0di\u00a0Milano<\/strong>\u00a0with a degree in\u00a0Electrical Engineering<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
1946 - 1984<\/h2><\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
In 1946, as a newly qualified engineer, Carlo<\/strong>\u00a0Alberto<\/strong> embarked on his career in the R&D department of Magneti Marelli<\/strong>, where he designed the horn for the Guzzino 65cc, the double-blade windscreen wiper motor of the 500C and the first electromagnetic lorry brake. He then became technical director at Enrico Bezzi<\/strong> electric motors. In late 1950, he went to work with his father Efisio, and in 1951 he was handed the<\/strong> managerial reins<\/strong>. Having consolidated his experience in Belgium and France at the companies represented by his father, Carlo Alberto led and guided the company<\/strong> through the period of innovation and economic boom<\/strong>. He expanded its scope with the French company SPIERTZ<\/strong> presses, one of the leading European press manufacturers for sheet metal stamping, both for household appliances, which he sold to IGNIS<\/strong>, ZOPPAS<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0ZANUSSI<\/strong>, among others, and for car bodies, supplying all the major\u00a0FIAT, LANCIA, INNOCENTI\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0ALFA ROMEO\u00a0<\/strong>factories in Italy and around the world, from Togliatti to Bursa in Turkey or Concord SA in Argentina.<\/span><\/p>\nThese presses<\/strong> were so successful<\/strong> that in the end he made up his mind to manufacture them under licence<\/strong> in Italy at the SASS<\/strong> factory in Borgaretto, which later became COMAU. He also branched out into the \u2018new\u2019 industry<\/strong> of spring production<\/strong> machines<\/strong> with the company HERCKELBOUT<\/strong>,\u00a0the third largest manufacturer of this type of machinery at the time, after WAFIOS and HACK. He was also a representative of HACK<\/strong> until the latter closed its doors: as an enlightened \u2018pioneer\u2019, he sold the first electronic spring machines ever built, which would go on to become the gold standard for this type of production years later.<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
READ MORE<\/h5>\n\t\t\t\tIt was in fact this opening<\/strong> into the thriving world of spring manufacturers that led him to meet<\/strong> the gifted Otto<\/strong>\u00a0BIHLER<\/strong>,\u00a0followed immediately afterwards by the company AICHELIN<\/strong>\u00a0for the\u00a0heat treatment<\/strong>\u00a0of\u00a0springs<\/strong>\u00a0and small parts. The fledgling company BIHLER took its first steps largely on the Italian market, where Italian imagination had a field day with these ingenious and innovative machines, to the extent that the name Bihler has become a byword for a type of technology for making stamped and formed parts.\u00a0The Italian<\/strong> nuts and bolts industry<\/strong>, now one of the biggest in Europe and around the world, was approached<\/strong> by Carlo Alberto<\/strong> in a big way and with great success<\/strong> in the early 1950s. Visiting the large German nuts and bolts manufacturers, market leaders at the time, such as the famous BAUER & SCHAURTE in Neuss,\u00a0he studied<\/strong> their heat treatment rooms<\/strong>, which were already equipped with AICHELIN furnaces, initially of the shaker hearth kind and then with conveyor for large production runs. Drawing on his connections with\u00a0FIAT<\/strong>, he \u2018knocked on the door\u2019 of the FIAT nuts and bolts factory in Avigliana, which purchased the first plants. Immediately after, he also visited the fledgling FONTANA<\/strong> nuts and bolts manufacturer in Veduggio, marking the start of a long relationship that blossomed into a wonderful life-long friendship with a man almost his own age, Sir Loris Fontana. The latter had founded the company in 1952 with his brother, Senator Walter. Back then it was fitted out with small electric furnaces, as Sir Loris was fearful of gas. The first furnaces were in fact electric, then Carlo Alberto tried to convince Sir Loris to use gas. However, the real barrier to selling high-capacity furnaces, which ran on gas, to FONTANA, was the fact that there was no gas in Veduggio. But Carlo Alberto didn\u2019t lose heart. He convinced his friend Enrico Mattei, the head of ENI, with his \u2018SPECIAL INTERVENTIONS TEAM\u2019, to disconnect the gas pipe from Renate railway station, one Saturday night, and pass it under the railway tracks to Veduggio, which sounds like something out of a sci-fi novel these days! But this gives us an insight into what Italy was like during the boom years.<\/span><\/p>\nFaced with the excessive red tape of modern times, Carlo Alberto would always recall this event, saying that in many cases we would need those special TEAMS that could work WITHOUT permits or authorisations.\u00a0A\u00a0technical partnership<\/strong>\u00a0was established between<\/strong>\u00a0Loris<\/strong>,\u00a0Carlo<\/strong>\u00a0Alberto<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Heinz<\/strong>\u00a0Berger<\/strong>\u00a0(from the family that owned AICHELIN). This led to the\u00a0supply<\/strong>\u00a0of\u00a0dozens<\/strong>\u00a0of\u00a0plants<\/strong>, as well as to the introduction<\/strong>\u00a0of a whole host of innovations<\/strong>\u00a0for hardening and tempering furnaces<\/strong>\u00a0for bolts<\/strong> compared to the American competitor HOLCROFT (now part of the AICHELIN group). One such innovation, in the late 1960s, was the introduction<\/strong> of RADIAX burners<\/strong>, the first ever with built-in recovery system. Another, once again in Veduggio at the FONTANA factory, was the introduction of the first REKUMAT\u00ae<\/strong>\u00a0recuperative burners in 1973. AICHELIN\u2019s technical expert was the young \u2014 and later famous \u2014 Dr J.A. W\u00fcnning, who worked with AICHELIN until setting up his own company, WS, in 1982.Dr J.A. W\u00fcnning\u2019s many patents and hundreds of publications included the only recently expired patent<\/strong> for FLAMLESS<\/strong> burners, which are a hot topic today due to their distinctive feature, i.e. their ability to slash NOx emissions<\/strong>.\u00a0During his stay in Germany in the early 1980s, Efisio<\/strong>\u00a0had<\/strong> the good fortune<\/strong> of having<\/strong> Dr J.A. W\u00fcnning as a \u2018teacher<\/strong>\u2019, not only for burner technologies, but also for<\/strong> techniques<\/strong> in protective atmospheres<\/strong>, in which W\u00fcnning was a real expert. Collaborations with other nuts and bolts manufacturers followed, starting with BRUGOLA \u2014 where the massive 3000 kg\/h AICHELIN furnace was installed, still the biggest in Europe to this day \u2014 and later AGRATI, which were already customers at the time of the famous Mosquito and later as AGRATI-GARELLI. As well as with the BONTEMPI, VESCOVINI, USORINI, SACCHETTI, and STORCHI \u2018families\u2019, to name but a few. Needless to say,\u00a0Carlo Alberto forged working relationships<\/strong> and friendships<\/strong> with all these<\/strong> nuts and bolts manufacturer \u2018families\u2019<\/strong>, and these relationships are still going strong today<\/strong>, even after the passing of the baton to Efisio.<\/span><\/p>\nCarlo Alberto passed away in 2022, aged 99. He had more than 70 years of work behind him, 38 of which with his son Efisio.<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
1984 - 2016<\/h2><\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
In the 1980s, the grandson<\/strong> Efisio<\/strong>, he too an engineer<\/strong>, but a mechanical<\/strong> engineer this time, entered the company after gaining extensive experience abroad in Germany and France at various companies: DB, ZF, SKF, BMW, TK, Fichtel & Sachs, Schlumberger, and last but not least in the AICHELIN technical HQ in Korntal for the design of new kinds of furnaces. He set out<\/strong> to introduce new production processes<\/strong> based on what he had learnt during his international experiences. He began by introducing the new AICHELIN<\/strong>\u00a0soft nitriding<\/strong> technology (using the\u00a0NITROC\u00ae<\/strong> process, patented by J.A.W\u00fcnning) into FIAT for crankshafts, borrowed from his experiences at BMW. Then, once again in FIAT, under the direction of the engineer Vittorio Ghidella \u2014 with whom Efisio had enjoyed a productive technical relationship when Mr Ghidella was still working for RIV-SKF<\/strong> in Villar Perosa, where he had been just as attentive as he was later on in FIAT to technical choices to improve product quality \u2014 he introduced the\u00a0AICHELIN-HEESS<\/strong>\u00a0press quenching technology for car gearboxes to improve their synchronisation and noise. This technology was then introduced in Turkey, China, Poland and Brazil. He rounded off, more recently, with the new low pressure carburising technology<\/strong> with\u00a0ALD<\/strong>\u00a0for\u00a0dual-clutch gearboxes<\/strong>. But Ghidella wasn't there any more at this point: these were already the times of Sergio Marchionne, just after the divorce from GM.In the 1990s, Efisio<\/strong>\u00a0created<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0developed<\/strong>\u00a0a\u00a0new division<\/strong>\u00a0in the company, specialising in iron and steel<\/strong>. Alongside EBNER<\/strong>, he\u00a0led the complete conversion<\/strong> of the Italian iron and steel industry<\/strong> for the annealing<\/strong> of sheet<\/strong> or wire rod coils<\/strong> from hydrogen nitrogen mixtures (HNX) to 100% hydrogen atmospheres, which not only improved matters from a quality perspective, but also resulted in huge savings<\/strong> in terms<\/strong> of cycle times<\/strong> and consumption<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
READ MORE<\/h5>\n\t\t\t\tThis began with the forerunner\u00a0
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.carutti.it\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/tradizione-e-innovazione-1.jpg\")
\r\n <\/a>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.carutti.it\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/azienda-di-rappresentanza-1.jpg\")
\r\n <\/a>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.carutti.it\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/azienda-familiare-per-soluzioni-metallurgiche-1.jpg\")
\r\n <\/a>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.carutti.it\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/rappresentanza-per-aziende-siderurgiche.jpg\")
\r\n <\/a>