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Galvstar – New Mill to Produce Galfan Beginning in June 2011

By Steel Market Update : www.steelmarketupdate.com

Thursday, January 27 2011

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There is a new coating line under construction in Buffalo, New York. Galvstar LLC is being built in the former American Axle & Manufacturing plant on the East Side of Buffalo.

According to one of the principles behind Galvstar LLC, the line will be capable of coating approximately 250,000 tons of material on an annualized basis at peak capacity. The product range will be from .060” on the heavy end up to .012” on the light end in widths out to 60”. The mill is projected to begin production in June 2011.

The mill will apply to their substrate a zinc/aluminum coating which is called: Galfan.

One of the owners advised SMU in an email the target market will be construction products.

On the Galvstar website, the company compares various galvanized coating weights against the equivalent Galfan coating. For example, G90 galvanized (90 oz/ft2) is reported to be the equivalent to GF 45 (45 oz/ft2). Steel buyers may want to contact either Galvstar or the Galfan Technology Center to discuss how the Galfan product compares to both galvanized and Galvalume steels.

For commercial inquiries, the contact person for Galvstar is Howard Rekoon, email:hrekoon@galvstar.com

About Galfan

What makes this company especially interesting to Steel Market Update is it will be producingGalfan which is a 95% zinc and almost 5% aluminum coated steel utilizing the hot-dipped galvanized process. The product was patented in 1981 and was formerly produced in the United States by Weirton Steel for a number of years.

Based on the conversations we have had with former representatives of Weirton as well as Mr. Thomas Ranck who is with the Galfan Technology Center which is responsible for promoting the use of Galfan, the product was first produced as a superior product to galvanized and Galvalume. The product was shown to have good formability and was better than Galvalume when it was first produced in preventing “edge creep” or red rust on the cut edge portion of a coil.

Weirton Steel was unable to successfully build a steady order book during the time they were marketing the product. There was some success with unexposed and drawn automotive parts as well as in the construction products area. According to the past Weirton commercial people with which SMU has had contact over the past few days, one of the biggest issues was the desire by Weirton to sell the product for a premium against galvanized steel.

The Galfan website shows a number of potential applications for Galfan in sheet or coil form. This includes: cladding, roofing, patrician walls, doors, ceilings, steel framing for residential homes, window frames, snow guards, nail board, spiral-duct in the building and construction markets. They also referenced various uses in appliances, the industrial sector and automotive. For more insights please visit the Galfan website.

SMU will continue to follow the progress of Galvstar as the mill begins production and starts shipping prime coils into the marketplace. We hope the mill will invite SMU to view the facility once it is running.