JFE Steel Corporation announced that it has developed the world’s first API X80 grade high frequency welded steel pipe with thickness of one inch (25.4 mm). JFE Steel also announced that it has received the first two commercial orders for its uniquely thick HFW pipe.

The HFW pipe is being manufactured at a refurbished 26 inch HFW steel pipe mill within the company’s Chita Works. API X80 grade, means the pipe’s minimum yield strength is 555 MPa.

The orders for the new one inch wall HFW steel pipe were placed by Dril-Quip Inc. and GE Oil & Gas, two of the world’s leading manufacturers of oil and natural gas drilling equipment. They will use the pipes as conductor casing, or steel pipe that is mainly used to secure blowout preventers and wellhead equipment before drilling the casing hole. Shipments to both customers will take place this spring.

As drilling operations for oil and natural gas expand around the world, oil companies are drilling into and pumping from increasingly deep seabeds, requiring them to use steel pipes with extra strong, extra thick walls capable of withstanding very high pressures to support drilling operations. As it has been technically difficult to produce such HFW steel pipes continuously with a high degree of accuracy, many oil companies have used DSAW or seamless pipes for conductor casings in especially harsh environments.

JFE Steel, an expert in the production of high-strength, thick wall steel pipes, developed forming technology for the cost effective production of X80 grade HFW steel pipe with an unprecedented thickness of one inch. The company also established an integrated system of processes from steelmaking to pipe forming, to produce this special pipe.

The company expects its new HFW steel pipe to be used not only as conductor casing, but also as high quality line pipes for offshore pipelines and other purposes.

From http://www.steelguru.com/international_news/JFE_Steel_develops_world_first_X80_grade_HFW_pipe/333814.html