Correcting myself from Yesterday: TKMS, Marmen, and Canadian production of 1.3964 Grade steel.

Every so often I make a mistake that ends up surprising me to a healthy degree. Yesterday was one of those days. Yesterday we got TKMS’s first partnership as part of CPSP with the announcement that they had signed a Teaming Agreement with Marmen for the production of sections and critical components for the Type 212CD.

At that moment, I made a bold statement. I said that Canada lacks production of the 1.3964 steel that the 212CD is likely based off of—similar to the Type 212A. First, I do want to correct this and say that its use isn't officially confirmed; however, I have it on good authority that it is either 1.3964 or similar.

A friend of mine reached out to me last night, though, and told me something interesting. While there is no active production of 1.3964 steel in Canada—aka an active, visible production line—there is one mill in Canada, one even I forgot despite talking about it before, who could make it.

Valbruna ASW of Welland, Ontario is Canada’s premier specialty steel producer. Valbruna is the lineal successor to Atlas Steels, founded in 1918. Atlas Steels was, for decades, one of the crown jewels of Canadian steel, being the primary domestic supplier of high-speed tool steels, mining drill steels, and eventually stainless steels for the Allied effort in World War II.

However, the 1980s and 1990s—characterized by the rise of mini-mills and Asian competition—led to the fragmentation of the Atlas empire. The facility passed through various ownerships, including Rio Algom and MMFX, before being acquired by Acciaierie Valbruna S.p.A. in 2019.

Acciaierie Valbruna S.p.A is a noted producer of 1.3964 grade steel globally, and Valbruna ASW does list it as one of their capabilities. However, I had to make sure, so I reached out to the company to ask: yes, Valbruna ASW can produce 1.3964 grade steel. They have the equipment to do so.

The company recently commissioned a new 70-tonne Electric Arc Furnace in 2023. However, that alone is not suitable enough for production. 1.3964 grade requires the control of high nitrogen content (0.20-0.35%) while maintaining low carbon.

Luckily for Valbruna ASW, they do have the equipment to do this. More specifically, they have the ability to perform both Argon Oxygen Decarburization (AOD) and Vacuum Oxygen Decarburization (VOD). These two are critical for the production of 1.3964 grade steel.

Using nitrogen as the dilution gas, Valbruna can inject gaseous nitrogen into the molten steel, allowing them to precisely control the nitrogen content. They can then use VOD for removing hydrogen from the mix, allowing them to lower the carbon content to the required level.

With this, Valbruna can, if needed, produce 1.3964 grade in Canada. However, there is a catch. Valbruna doesn't actually make plates. Valbruna is primarily a producer of long products (bars, billets) unsuitable for what we need. HOWEVER, they also produce large bottom-poured ingots up to 62,000 lbs (approx. 28 tonnes) with diameters up to 53 inches.

So Valbruna can make it; however, they can't roll them into plates themselves. For that, we require someone else. At the time of this writing, I am still classifying everyone. There are a lot of people. My primary focus is within the St. Lawrence corridor, or just out of it, to keep the supply chain short and reasonable.

Now, I am not the foremost expert on steel production. Despite being from Hamilton, where you think I would pick it up, none of my family ever actually worked in the industry. Most of the men in my family worked for CN. My mother was a welder, but asking her about the complexities of steel has been… interesting.

Now I live in Sudbury, where I still don't fully understand, but I try my best for you guys. The immediate concern is that the few people who could do this, primarily the likes of Algoma, are—as we said yesterday—producers of Carbon Steel.

You can't necessarily just throw a chunk of Non-Magnetic steel at them and call it a day. Why? Free Iron Contamination. It’s what happens when particles of plain carbon steel (which is magnetic and rusts) get embedded into the surface of stainless steel (which is non-magnetic and shouldn't rust).

For a submarine like the 212CD, where the stealth provided by a non-magnetic hull is paramount, this would be a death sentence—a critical failure—and so everything must be taken to ensure there is no contamination anywhere in the process. Companies like Valbruna and Marmen regularly work with this kind of steel. They have the facilities and processes to protect against such a thing.

Other places? Not so much… Add on the limited amount of places that have the equipment to do plate to the scale needed, and you have a very narrow point in the supply chain. Now again, I am not an expert. I am still trying to document everything. I was already reading into this subject because I wanna talk submarine maintenance; however, my focus has still been on HY-100 in the KSS-III. I haven't gotten to the 1.3964 grade yet.

However, this is a major risk. Somewhere like Algoma can't just roll out stainless with the same equipment they use to make carbon and High-Strength Low-Alloy (HSLA) steel and plate. They can't risk that contamination, even with the usual fixes of shaving and acid bathing to remove the contaminants.

Outside of Algoma, there is limited capacity. Someone mentioned to me the possibility that Finkl Steel in Sorel could do it. They're more of a "boutique" forge. They are used to making small numbers of very expensive, high-spec parts. However, they specialize in making die blocks, not forged plates. So we might be getting closer to what we need, but there is still a missing component.

They could forge stuff like the drive shafts and heavy machinery mounts though, so they might not be entirely useless to the process. A fun fact is that they operate a 5,000-ton hydraulic forging press—one of the most powerful in Canada!

However, this isn’t suitable for submarine hulls. We are likely stuck looking for someone who could roll it out. This remains the critical gap. As far as I can find, and calling around this morning, there isn't a readily available person to do this within our Ontario/Quebec supply chain.

Marmen can do the Fabrication Rolling. They recently acquired two Faccin 4HEP-S420WT plate rolling systems. They have experience working on American submarines and producing sections of this size. The issue now shifts from the raw supply—which I thought was going to be the big issue—into finding someone who could take the ingot and make the plates.

Now, we could invest in such capacity. That is entirely possible, and likely the way this is gonna work. We would be adding new capacity, and a very interesting one at that—one that Canada, as you can see, currently lacks. If TKMS is genuine about Canada being a long-term supplier to the company's efforts, then this is a small investment to make in the grand scheme.

Of course, it does get into one thing I will jump on: the complexity of 1.3964 steel and Canadian industry's readiness to tackle it—not just here talking about manufacturing, but also the facilities, the people. It's an inherent disadvantage on this front that TKMS has compared to Hanwha. HY-100 is easy for us. The Vickys themselves use HY-80. It's something we have experience in, where we know how to work with it, where the workforce knows how to work with it.

That is an inherent advantage. Of course, Valbruna can also make HY-100, funny enough, and someone like Algoma with the right time could also produce it if needed. A lot of people could. It's far easier to tailor the supply chain to it, and that inherently presents some advantages maintenance-wise, as Hanwha could easily leverage multiple potential suppliers relatively easily if they wanted.

TKMS doesn't have that option, as you can see. The opportunities are far more limited just because of what that inner pressure hull is made out of. Of course, if any of you know someone who does have this capacity, please let me know. I would love to question them! I also wanna say that I am new to steel. I have reached out to people to be educated. However, this is a new subject for me. I was a carpentry kid. I like wood.

So if you see me making a mistake, please correct me. I wanna make sure I'm good when I talk submarine maintenance!