Crane Co. — Asbestos Products Reference

Manufacturer: Crane Co. Headquarters: Stamford, CT Founded: 1855 Documented Asbestos Use: Through approximately 1985 Product Categories: Valves, pumps, gaskets, compressed sheet packing materials

Company History

Crane Co. is one of the oldest and most continuously operating industrial manufacturers in the United States, tracing its origins to 1855 when Richard Teller Crane founded a small brass foundry in Chicago, Illinois. Over the following century and a half, the company grew into a diversified industrial conglomerate supplying fluid handling equipment, building products, and aerospace components to markets across the country and abroad.

Throughout the mid-twentieth century, Crane Co. was a primary supplier of valves, pumps, and pipe fittings to the industries that formed the backbone of American manufacturing and infrastructure — including shipbuilding, chemical processing, power generation, paper mills, and oil refining. The company’s products were found in virtually every type of heavy industrial facility built or operated between the 1940s and 1980s, a period during which asbestos was the standard material used in high-temperature, high-pressure sealing and packing applications.

Crane Co. has been a defendant in asbestos personal injury litigation in jurisdictions across the United States. According to asbestos litigation records, tens of thousands of workers have filed claims alleging exposure to asbestos-containing components in Crane Co. products. The volume and geographic breadth of this litigation reflects the company’s extensive market presence during the decades when asbestos was most widely used in industrial settings. Unlike many other asbestos defendants, Crane Co. has not established a bankruptcy trust and continues to litigate claims through the civil court system.

Asbestos-Containing Products

Crane Co. manufactured and sold several categories of products that, according to court filings and asbestos litigation records, contained asbestos as a functional component.

Industrial Valves with Asbestos Packing

Crane Co. was a major producer of industrial valves — including gate valves, globe valves, check valves, and ball valves — sold under the Crane brand and used extensively in piping systems throughout refineries, power plants, shipyards, and industrial plants. Plaintiffs in asbestos litigation alleged that these valves were manufactured and sold with asbestos-containing stem packing as a standard component.

Stem packing is the material compressed around the valve stem to prevent process fluid from leaking out of the valve body. According to asbestos litigation records, Crane Co. valves were commonly fitted with braided asbestos rope packing or asbestos-containing compression packing. This packing required periodic removal and replacement during routine valve maintenance. Workers performing that maintenance — pipefitters, millwrights, and maintenance mechanics — were alleged to have disturbed asbestos-containing packing material in the course of cutting out old packing, cleaning the stuffing box, and installing new packing material.

Court filings in multiple jurisdictions document that Crane Co. valve packing was specified in maintenance procedures and was sold both as original equipment and as replacement packing through industrial supply channels.

Pumps with Asbestos Stuffing Box Packing

According to asbestos litigation records, Crane Co. manufactured industrial pumps equipped with asbestos-containing stuffing box packing. Pumps in industrial service require similar packing materials to those used in valves — a compressible, heat-resistant material installed around the rotating pump shaft to prevent process fluid from leaking along the shaft.

Plaintiffs alleged that Crane Co. pumps were sold with asbestos packing installed and that replacement packing supplied or specified by Crane Co. also contained asbestos. Pump mechanics and millwrights performing routine packing replacement were alleged to have been exposed when cutting out deteriorated asbestos packing, cleaning the stuffing box area, and tamping new packing rings into place — tasks that could generate asbestos fiber release in the immediate work area.

The stuffing box packing in large industrial pumps was typically replaced on a scheduled maintenance cycle, meaning that workers in facilities operating Crane Co. pumps may have performed this procedure repeatedly over the course of a career.

Compressed Asbestos Sheet

Court filings document that Crane Co. also marketed compressed asbestos sheet gasket material, sometimes referred to as compressed asbestos fiber (CAF) sheet or compressed asbestos sheet (CAS). This material was used to fabricate cut gaskets for use at flanged pipe connections, valve bonnets, pump casings, and other pressure boundary joints throughout industrial piping systems.

According to asbestos litigation records, pipefitters and boilermakers working with this material cut gaskets from sheet stock using knives, scissors, or die-cutting tools — tasks that plaintiffs alleged generated respirable asbestos dust. Similarly, removing old compressed asbestos gaskets from flange faces — using scrapers, wire brushes, or grinding tools — was alleged to release asbestos fibers. Crane Co. compressed asbestos sheet was reportedly sold through industrial distribution networks and was used both in original equipment assembly and in field maintenance across a broad range of industries.

Occupational Exposure

Workers who handled Crane Co. valves, pumps, and gasket materials during the company’s period of documented asbestos use — roughly the 1940s through the mid-1980s — may have incurred occupational asbestos exposure. According to asbestos litigation records, the following trades and occupational groups have been identified as potentially exposed:

  • Pipefitters and steamfitters who installed and maintained valve and piping systems, replaced valve packing, and fabricated and replaced flanged gaskets
  • Pump mechanics and millwrights who performed stuffing box packing replacement on Crane Co. industrial pumps
  • Boilermakers who worked on high-pressure steam systems incorporating Crane Co. valves and fittings with asbestos packing and gaskets
  • Shipyard workers — including pipe shop workers, hull outfitters, and engine room crews — in facilities where Crane Co. valves and pumps were specified for naval and commercial vessel construction
  • Power plant operators and maintenance workers at steam-generating facilities where Crane Co. equipment was commonly installed
  • Chemical plant and refinery workers who maintained piping and rotating equipment in process environments requiring high-temperature, high-pressure sealing materials
  • Industrial maintenance mechanics performing general plant maintenance across a range of manufacturing facilities

The exposure risk associated with Crane Co. products was not limited to workers who directly handled the products. According to court filings, bystander workers — those present in the immediate area during valve repacking or gasket replacement — may also have been exposed to airborne asbestos fibers generated by those tasks.

Facilities with particularly high concentrations of Crane Co. equipment, as documented in litigation records, have included naval shipyards, commercial shipbuilding facilities, paper mills, fossil fuel power stations, petroleum refineries, and chemical manufacturing plants operating during the peak period of post-World War II industrial expansion in the United States.

Crane Co. has not filed for bankruptcy protection and has not established an asbestos bankruptcy trust fund. The company continues to be an active defendant in asbestos personal injury and wrongful death litigation filed in civil courts across the United States.

According to asbestos litigation records, Crane Co. has been named in a substantial volume of lawsuits brought by workers and their surviving family members alleging that exposure to asbestos in Crane Co. products caused mesothelioma, asbestos-related lung cancer, asbestosis, and other asbestos-related diseases. Plaintiffs alleged that Crane Co. knew or should have known of the hazards associated with asbestos in its products and that the company failed to provide adequate warnings to workers who used or maintained those products.

One significant development in Crane Co.-related litigation involved the Crane Co. v. North American insurance coverage dispute, which established precedent in the allocation of asbestos liability costs between manufacturers and their insurers. Court filings from that and related proceedings have contributed to a substantial body of documented evidence regarding Crane Co.’s historical asbestos product lines, the nature of worker exposure, and the company’s internal knowledge of asbestos hazards during the relevant periods.

Because no trust fund exists, individuals with Crane Co. asbestos claims must pursue recovery through direct litigation against the company in civil court. Crane Co. continues to actively contest liability and damages in these proceedings.

No trust fund is available for Crane Co. claims. Individuals who believe they were exposed to asbestos through Crane Co. valves, pumps, or gasket materials — or family members of workers who developed mesothelioma, lung cancer, or asbestosis — must pursue claims through the civil litigation system.

If you or a family member worked as a pipefitter, pump mechanic, millwright, boilermaker, shipyard worker, or industrial maintenance worker from the 1940s through the mid-1980s, and Crane Co. products were present at your worksite, you may have grounds for a personal injury or wrongful death claim directly against Crane Co.

Because Crane Co. is an active litigation defendant, claims are subject to statutes of limitations that vary by state and disease type. Consulting an attorney experienced in asbestos litigation is strongly recommended to evaluate exposure history, document product identification, and file within applicable deadlines.

This reference article is intended for informational purposes for workers, families, and legal professionals researching asbestos exposure history. It does not constitute legal advice.