Metallurgy at Continental

Consistency in the performance of our steel is crucially important to our clients — and to us.

Metallurgical engineering can be thought of as a subset of chemical engineering dealing mainly with the metallic elements. Our metallurgical engineer establishes specifications for the material we purchase, defining the appropriate parameters required for each grade to meet our customers’ needs.

Each steel vendor must be evaluated, often in person, for the ability to meet our specifications. These vendors are constantly scrutinized and re-evaluated.

Chemistry, test frequency, test locations and temperatures, permissible variations, non-destructive testing methods, steel-making practices, refining, casting and rolling methods must all be spelled out in explicit detail to ensure the steel will meet our customers' varying requirements.

Our metallurgical engineer is also involved in the administration of Continental’s ISO 9001:2008 quality program, which defines the required processes for control of product and service quality. Continental has been registered ISO since 1997.