🎧 Raising the Bar

Specifying materials and the right suppliers for projects can be fraught with challenges, especially when searching for high-performance stainless and nickel alloys. MTD magazine gets an insight into material selection from Langley Alloys to provide our readers with a greater overview. 

Founded in 1938, Langley Alloys was created to develop high-performance alloys for naval and aerospace applications and its history includes the patent for the very first commercial super duplex stainless steel, Ferralium 255 and the invention of the highest-strength copper-nickel alloy Hiduron. This is now widely used in modern subsea applications.

Rising from the special copper alloys division of High Duty Alloys and developed into a fully integrated metal production company on a site at Langley in West London, it grew steadily throughout World War II. This acceleration was accredited to several successful alloy developments, including the high-strength Naval alloy Hidurax Special and the copper-bearing alloy, Hidurel® 5, which was a major engine bearing on the Spitfire aircraft. Elements of its proud history are still visible today, as Langley Alloys continues to supply a family of unique products for demanding applications.

Continued investment in in-house inspection, testing and machining capabilities allows Langley Alloys to be a ‘one-stop’ supplier of choice, saving manufacturers considerable cost, time and effort. As Rodney Rice from Langley Alloys tells MTDCNC: “We have three metallurgists within the business, so we can easily translate the difficult parts of customers’ requirements and specifications into a simple order. Dealing with the uncertainties of the material supply chain can be complicated. For us, it’s about having a plan and being flexible. Looking at customer demand and their requirements, we are looking at metal pricing and we are trying to assimilate all of that information with science and a little bit of gut feeling to decide what stock we should be carrying, when and in what quantities.”

“Every piece of stock for sale is catalogued and captured on our inventory management system. So we know exactly what we’ve got, where it is and if it’s available with all the paperwork that tracks its traceability. This is fundamentally important to all of our customers. When we supply to CNC machinists, they will take cut pieces, full-length random bars or pieces cut to a certain length to fit a bar feed. It’s all about presenting the material in the best possible way. A standard bar will have a plus tolerance anyway but depending on the application, we can supply ground, straightened or polished material for more critical tolerance work.”

“Our business is best known for duplex and super duplex steels, but we also offer a range of nickel alloys and copper nickel alloys as well. These are all high-strength, highly corrosion-resistant and high-performance. The one thing these materials have in common is they are suitable for wet corrosive aggressive environments. There will be a solution for pretty much any application.”

“When it comes to traceability, it is absolutely fundamental for our customers’ applications, so we take a great deal of time and effort to make sure we can maintain the traceability of the product. We colour code, hard stamp and label materials to ensure that the location of the material is tightly controlled at all times. As the business continues to grow, we’ll continue to explore export markets as this has been extremely successful for our business. We may add one or two more products to the portfolio, but on a technical level, we are excited to look at some of these newer markets and applications. Desalination is becoming more mainstream, hydrogen economy is going to pause more challenges in terms of metal selection the medical industry is a growing market segment,” concludes Rodney.