Birmingham, Alabama-based American Steel Pipe, a division of American Cast Iron Pipe Company, announced Thursday that it will expand its steel pipe operations, adding a processing facility to its North Mill. The facility will cost more than $55 million to construct. The company manufactures electric-resistance-welded (ERW) steel pipe in diameters from 10.75 to 20 inches in its South Mill, and 16 to 24 inches in its North Mill, and it produces ERW pipe up to 84 feet in length for the oil and gas industries.
The new, 150,000-square-foot facility will house state-of-the-art testing equipment, including two hydrotesters, two ultrasonic testing machines and a new end facing system to bevel the ends of the pipe. The current processing facility will be decoupled from the North Mill and adjoined to the plant’s South Mill, doubling its processing capacity.
“Currently, pipe processing is our constraint,” said Jon Noland, division sales manager. “By doubling our processing capacity for both mills, it’s feasible we could double our output; that would mean an annual capacity of around 700,000 net tons.”
The expansion is slated for completion in 2014. “Construction of the new facility will begin by the end of this year, and the new equipment is expected to arrive by the end of second quarter next year,” said Joe Thomas, AMERICAN senior engineering project manager. “Our aim is to have the new facility online by this time next year.”
The company is also making other upgrades to its North Mill, including a new marking system, steel skelp leveler, weld stand, flying cutoff and seam annealers.
“The entire operation will be practically new,” Noland said. “With production upgrades and the new processing facility, we will be able to make pipe far more efficiently than we can now, allowing us to compete with anyone in the world on lead times for the highest quality ERW steel pipe.”
