Duplex Stainless Steel Pipe’s Edge
Today many shipping companies prefer Duplex Stainless Steel Pipe over other kinds of steel. Duplex offers higher durability, stronger resistance against corrosion cracking, and better pricing and pricing stability. Below is a brief overview on the pros and cons of this metal.
Duplex Stainless Steel Pipe: Origins
To understand duplex as a type of stainless steel, you should know its cousins. One is ferritic steel, which is based on Chromium and trace amount of Carbon. Another is austenitic steel, which is made of Nickel, Manganese, and Nitrogen. Both steels are inferior to duplex stainless steel in some ways.
Austenitic steel has lower strength and lower resistance to cracking, not mentioning that Nickel changes in price every now and then and is therefore not favorable to many steel manufacturers. Ferritic steel on the other hand has problems in terms weldability, strength, and durability especially in low temperatures.
Duplex steel pipe is made to combine the strengths and reduce the weaknesses of ferrite and austentite steel. Duplex stainless steel offers better durability, allowing manufacturers to reduce typical thickness and weight and giving ship makers more options. Duplex as mentioned has good weldability, which means manufacturers exert fewer efforts in their applications. The steel is very tough particularly at low temperatures, and by this we mean below 50 degree Celsius up to hundreds. This is very important especially in water tanks, engines, pipes, and many other structures subjected to cold temperatures.
Why Duplex Stainless Steel Pipes Is A Competitive Choice
Using duplex has many pros, but it also has cons. Duplex stainless steel’s marketed durability can be a disadvantage for manufacturers since it requires very expensive equipment to form and bend the metal. The expensiveness of equipment however is offset by the pricing of duplex, which is relatively a lot cheaper than other types of stainless steel.
But all in all, duplex is a competitive choice, offering a wide spectrum of corrosion resistance to match different shipping uses. It boasts toughness down to very low temperatures, and is highly resistant to stress corrosion cracking. The challenge for buyers is to find a good manufacturer or dealer that provides high quality and price-friendly products.