Outokumpu Stainless Steel Creates Lighter Tanks and Lower Maintenance Costs
05/07/2013 - Outokumpu delivered 150 tons of stainless steel sheet for the construction of storage tanks by Japrotek, a Finnish company that produces agitators, pressure vessels and large tanks, built on site, for the process industries.
Outokumpu delivered 150 tons of stainless steel sheet for the construction of storage tanks by Japrotek, a Finnish company that produces agitators, pressure vessels and large tanks, built on site, for the process industries.
Originally Japrotek’s end-customer had selected carbon steel as its chosen material. Outokumpu presented its new tool which calculates and compares different materials, taking into account weight and thickness as well as welding, finishing and, last but not least, maintenance costs. This allows customers to make decision based on total cost of the investment throughout its life cycle. Part of this tool, calculating shell thickness, is also available at www.outokumpu.com/en/Products/Tools.
Based on these calculations, Japrotek recommended to its own customer that they replace carbon steel with LDX 2101® and austenitic stainless steel. The end-customer looked into the issue and chose these materials for the construction of its tank. Use of lean duplex reduces the tank weight, and use of stainless steel reduces maintenance costs significantly.
“The main reasons for switching to stainless steel were longer life-cycle time and lower maintenance costs as well as the good properties of LDX 2101® that makes it ideal for big tanks,” said Stig Sandström, sales manager at Japrotek. “Good product information we received at the Outokumpu site made us think about new options for the material. Cooperation with Outokumpu has been excellent, which makes big projects like this easier.”
