Increased Demand For Exotic Alloy Tubing In Middle East

Fine Tubes at ADIPEC 2012 Abu DhabiThe participation in the region’s most important oil and gas related conference and exhibition was part of the UK tube manufacturer’s plan in developing the Middle East region for exotic alloy tubing after recently establishing a network of partnering agents in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the Sultanate of Oman in addition to their long-term partner Petro Middle East in the U.A.E.

Fine Tubes were represented on the stand of Petro Middle East and with over 1,500 exhibitors and 45,000 visitors, the ADIPEC exhibition provided unexpected high number of visitors to the Fine Tubes booth.

Nick Head, Business Development Executive at Fine Tubes gives some insight: “The meetings at the show indicated strong interest in stainless steel 904L, 6Moly and Nickel alloy tubing matching our expertise is in manufacturing these specialist corrosion resistant products.” He further adds: “Particularly noticeable is the trend in moving from away from standard 316L type grades towards better performing alloys.”

“Despite that the majority of drilling projects being onshore in the Middle East, the number of offshore developments are increasing”, comments Ryan Dover, responsible for Oil and Gas upstream projects at Fine Tubes. ”This means deeper, more hostile and corrosive environments which again drives the demand for higher corrosion-resistant tubing because stainless steels just would not last in these hostile corrosive conditions. This is where our strength lies with our extensive range of super austenitic and nickel alloy grade tubes that can offer longer term solutions over stainless steels in those harsher environments.

“As a leading manufacturer for exotic alloy tubes we really hold a unique market position in being able to manufacture high grade alloys in both straight pieces and coils in welded or seamless form. This means we can offer a full range of engineering solutions for many applications and environments”, explains Nick, who has been with the company for over 27 years. “In the oil and gas industry our straight length tubing are used for hydraulic control and instrumentation lines, smooth bore tubing, high strength pressure housings and chemical injection lines, whereas coiled tubing are primarily used for steel tube umbilicals, downhole control lines, chemical injection lines, flow line bundle, control line tubing, downhole gauge cables. Our expertise in special grade stainless steels such as 904L, 6Moly and Nickel alloys also us an ideal partner for the supply of instrumentation packages used in the construction of Offshore FPSO, FPSS’s, Spars and TLP’s. “