Metal Information Center

Are alloy ships’ hulls the next opportunity? - copper-nickel alloys

November 20, 2007 – 1:14 pm

Are cupronickel ship hulls the next big market opportunity for metals producers? Walter Loyal, vice president and chief executive officer of a start-up company catering to that market, thinks so.

“It could be a million-pound-a-year market once it is developed,” he said in a recent interview.

Loyal’s Cooper-Nickel Boat Co. Ltd., Deal Island, Md., is in the process of building a 48-foot pleasure craft with a hull made entirely from cupronickel. He said he expects to unveil the yacht at the Annapolis Boat Show in October 1995, and it will contain approximately 16,000 pounds cupronickel.
Loyal said he was inspired by the New York-based Copper Development Association’s Copper Mariner project of the early 1970s, which featured steel-framed boats with hulls constructed of 706 cupronickel (90-percent copper and 10-percent nickel). “Data from the project show it had a corrosion rate of only 0.999995 inch a year,” Loyal said.

Copper-Nickel Boat’s yacht hull will be constructed of 90-10 cupronickel and will be welded with 70-30 cupronickel filler.

“All the hulls made in the United States at the moment are only made to last for the short term, to be used only about 20 years and then they deteriorate,” he said.

Fiberglass, Loyal expllained, is susceptible to “wicking” and blistering. “It blisters in the summer and freezes in the winter.” In addition, fiberglass takes on water when it expands, according to Dale Peters, vice president for industrial and marine markets for the Cooper Development Association, New York.
Steel and aluminum hulls corrode, Loyal continued. “With cupronickel, corrosion becomes your friend and actually preserves the hull. It forms a barrier that protects it from further corrosion.”

Cupronickel is also non-fouling, Peters said. “So the hull does not collect 6 to 8 inches of sea life as it would with steel. The result is a maintenance-free hull.”

Loyal said his company decided to go after the private, live-on-board market rather than the marine industry because “businesses are not looking for a quality hull. They view the hull as a throw-away item.”