Henderson lab seeks new uses for Timet’s titanium

Brian Seals

Monday, Nov. 2, 1998 | 11:37 a.m.

Without doubt, Titanium Metals Corp. is an aerospace industry supplier.

But, as Timet President Andrew Dixey says, that's a finite market -- there are only so many planes that are going to be built in any given year.

The finite market and waning aerospace demand for titanium in the post-Cold War era has forced Timet to look for other markets to sell its metal.

Fortunately for companies like Timet, new uses are springing up for titanium. Golf clubs. Skis. Bicycles. Watches. Wedding rings. Even buildings.

"You can almost put the word titanium on almost anything in the sporting industry and it will double the market," said Paul Allen, Timet's director of research at its Henderson laboratory.

Timet is primed to capitalize on that trend.

"Timet's strategy is clear," Dixey said during a recent phone interview. "We recognize our core industry is aerospace while at the same time recognizing that if we're going to grow Timet, we have to look for new uses."

That was illustrated last month when Timet announced a partnership with Tokyo-based Nippon Steel to market titanium architectural products in an attempt to capitalize on that burgeoning market. It's an area in which Timet has some experience, having supplied the titanium used in the exterior of the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain.

The museum, designed by famed architect Frank Gehry, featured 33,000 interlocking titanium panels that cloak the building's 364,000 square foot exterior.

"What is emerging is a new vogue using the attributes of titanium cosmetically on buildings," Dixey said "It's offering architects more freedom."

The selling point to architects is the metal is corrosion resistant and is lightweight. That allows a smaller building sub-structure and lower maintenance costs, Dixey said. It is widely used in Japan, but is just now making inroads as an architectural product in other parts of the world.

Timet's research laboratory in Henderson is the company's domestic center for exploring new uses for the metal.

Timet is based in Denver and has 37 facilities around the world, not counting joint ventures with other companies. The Henderson plant employs about 660 people and produces titanium in round cylinders, called ingots, which is then shipped to finishing plants across the country to be refined into a usable product.

Timet's Henderson research center has 22 engineers, technical staff and clerical support staff devoted to examining new applications, Allen said.

One of its main purposes is the effort to find new industrial uses to offset less business in the aerospace industry. That involves working with industrial customers to develop products they can use.

"We do a lot of problem solving," Allen said.

A portion of the lab is devoted to corrosion research. Offshore oil and gas pumping operations, for example, are using titanium because of its lightweight and corrosion resistant properties.

Often, working out an application with a customer involves testing various alloys, developing as many as 20 different types and paring them down to see which works best.

"Sometimes a customer will call and say they want to use titanium in a certain environment," Allen said. "We can't always tell them if it will work, so we try to simulate that environment."

To accomplish that, the lab has a small production facility to test new products. And if a problem arises later, the lab has computerized microscopes to detect and defects in the material.

The goal of this research is to find more uses, and keep Timet employees in Henderson and across the country working.

"The potential is great," Dixey said.

But for now, it is mostly just that -- potential. Timet officials acknowledge that non-aerospace uses are still a small percentage of the market. Though Timet controls about 25 percent of the world titanium market, the company's earnings still go the way of the aerospace industry.

That is evidenced by the company's recent earnings report in which it blamed reduced demand in the aerospace industry for lower than expected third quarter earnings. The company reported earnings of 50 cents per share compared with 64 cents per share for the same quarter last year.

Despite that, the company has reported increased sales each of the past three years, rising from $184.7 million in 1995 to $733.6 million in 1997.

The company is predicting lower-than-expected shipments for 1999, but that could be mitigated by a 10-year agreement with Boeing Co. that guarantees 70 percent of the titanium it and its subcontractors use will come from Timet.