A Trade Show Conversation That Changed Everything: SPIRA/flo Now Available in Hastelloy C-276

You know how trade shows go—you meet a ton of people and talk about a lot of problems. But every now and then, a conversation sticks with you because it challenges you to think differently. That’s exactly what happened to the SPIRA/flo team recently, leading to a monumental leap in our manufacturing capabilities.

The Problem: Corrosion vs. Friction

A potential customer came to our booth with a serious, familiar problem: their pneumatic conveying lines were a mess of angel hair, ribbons, and dusty build-up.

Nothing new there, right?

But their situation had a twist. Their proprietary plastic pellet contained additives so exceptionally corrosive that they were forced to use a special, exotic alloy—Hastelloy C-276—to keep their equipment from failing due to corrosion.

For years, they had been using smooth-bore tubing made from this highly resistant alloy. It worked great for fighting corrosion, but those smooth internal walls created intense amounts of friction. This friction, inherent to smooth pneumatic conveying, is the root cause of all their angel hair and dusting problems. They were stuck in a frustrating engineering trade-off: corrosion resistance at the cost of product quality.

They presented us with a simple, yet critical, question: "Can the SPIRA/flo process be added to Hastelloy C-276 tubing and pipe?"

Our honest answer at the time was, "I don't know for sure, but we can give it a try."

The Breakthrough: Combining Resistance and Flow

For the SPIRA/flo team, this question was a welcome challenge. Over the last two years, we’ve completely retooled and modernized our production lines. This investment in our technology allows us to apply the SPIRA/flo process to a huge range of tube and pipe materials and thicknesses. We saw no technical reason why our unique forming process wouldn't work on the specialized Hastelloy C-276 alloy.

The customer sent us a length of Hastelloy tubing, and the results were incredible.

The video above shows it all. The unique, pressed groove of SPIRA/flo was perfectly added to the material. It proved that we could combine the superior corrosion resistance of Hastelloy with the unmatched anti-friction properties of our SPIRA/flo design.

So, the answer is no longer "I don't know." It’s a confident: "Of course we can!"

What Makes This So Big?

The ability to successfully manufacture SPIRA/flo in Hastelloy C-276 is a game-changer for producers dealing with both highly corrosive and friction-sensitive materials.

Hastelloy C-276, for those who might not know, is a high-performance nickel-chromium-molybdenum-tungsten alloy. It’s renowned for being tough as nails, with exceptional resistance to pitting, crevice corrosion, and stress corrosion cracking in a wide array of chemical process environments. This is what makes it so vital for demanding applications where highly corrosive environments are present. Up until now, using this alloy meant sacrificing product quality due to the angel hair and fines generated by standard smooth-bore conveying lines.

SPIRA/flo Pipe and Tubing—a time-proven Delta Ducon innovation invented back in 1964—is designed to solve the friction problem at its core. Its proprietary internal spiral groove creates a fluid dynamic that gently guides pellets away from the pipe wall and through the center of the air stream. This reduces contact friction by up to 90%, which virtually eliminates the angel hair and fines that compromise product quality.

Now, with the successful application to Hastelloy C-276, we have eliminated the trade-off. Producers no longer have to choose between a pipe that resists corrosion and a pipe that preserves their valuable product. They can have both.

We’re proud to announce that SPIRA/flo Pipe and Tubing is now available in:

• Aluminum

• Stainless Steel

• Hastelloy C-276

• Other Metals - Who is ready to send us a sample to run?

  
  

We can apply the process to everything from thin-wall 10-gauge tubing all the way up to Schedule 80 pipe. Our modern production process ensures that producers and users of plastic pellets can finally get a long-lasting, reliable solution to their angel hair problems, no matter how specialized or corrosive the environment.

The bottom line: if you’re using an exotic alloy to handle a difficult product, you no longer have to accept the penalties of friction. The innovation that started with a simple trade show conversation is now a commercial reality, redefining the limits of pneumatic conveying.

Visit www.SPIRAfloPipe.com to learn more about this groundbreaking advancement in anti-friction conveying technology.