Aluminium prices that high ?

Being new to this forum, i'll start with a short Hello!

I might want to build myself an aluminium boat (sometime in the near future). So I was looking for prices on 'marine-grade' aluminium like 5052, 5083 etc.

The few prices I found are something like this;
-Aluminium 5083 plate, (various length/width), thickness 4mm/5mm (.16/.19 inch), aprox 15 EURO per kilo (~$19).

According to my calculations, the minimum for an open 5metres/16feet (fishing)boat, would be around 600 kilo of plate. That's before cutting, so including waste material.

Well let's see, that makes 600 * 15 euro = 9000 euro (~11500 USdollar) ... minimum
And then there are all the other costs ...

Is it really this expensive to build with aluminium

 

Metal prices

All metals are way up right now. Up until 6 months ago aluminum had been the bargain. We got hit with 2 20% increases so far this year. Copper has quadrupled in the last 18 months, and stainless is also way up.
They're blaming it on China and fuel prices.
It's a great time to be collecting scrap!

 

I had a visitor from a small boatbuilding company, building workboats in aluminium. He said they paid approx one euro per kg... I have to call him and see if I understood it right

 

@snal
Indeed
A recent article from a Dutch newspaper;
"There's an explosion in copper thefts [..] Especially lightning protectors are popular, these contain 100 - 500 Kg of copperwire. This makes 500 - 2500 euro on the black market. An estimate is that 30 - 50 of those systems dissapear on a weekly base, in earlier years the score was around 5 a year."

@Raggi_Thor
Well that sounds like a great price to me
I'm very curious about which kind of aluminium he uses and where his supplier is located.

 

Sheet can be bought at under 4 euros a kilo anywhere in EU if you a business, At least we can and we only by 50 tons a year.
Standard profiles are mainly under 4 euros but some tubes fetch as much as 6,5 euros a kilo.
Individuals can by most grades at 6-7 Euros a kilo from retailers.
A year ago September we paid 3,12 to for sheet 5083 and 3,37 for 6082 in june 2005 we managed to get under 3 Euros ocaisionaly.

 

@Richard Hillsid
Thanks! that's some usefull info.
I Just received an offer on 5083 sheet for 4 - 4.5 Euro a kilo. So that's not bad when I read your reply. My earlier calculations for 600Kg bruto makes now 2400 - 2700 Euro instead of 9000

 

Good for you winters AL is a good chose.

 

The actual price of 5083 is Euro 3,70 per kg ex. For special sizes, prices may come higher, above Euro 4,00. Prices are basen on quantities above 2000 kgs.

 

@D'ARTOIS
Great! I see you are from NL too. Do you have tips on where to go for 'actual prices' etc. ?

 

I can give you the NAW details of my supplier and you may ask him for a quotation: ALULAND, tel.: 078-6230020 - fax: 6230040 - they are supplied by Corus and Garfield Aluminium Industries
e-mail: info@aluland.com

 

Ok thanks alot

 

Is this with VAT or without?

 

Ex VAT

 

alum. prices

I recently was quoted $3/lb. for 4'X20" sheets in various th. from Alaskan Cu. here in Seattle, I know some builders get it for around $2.75/lb.

 

I checked here, it's around 30NOK/kg, almost 4Euro/kg or 5USD/kg or 2.5USD/lbs. That is ex VAT.
Prices change (rise) every day....

1Euro=8NOK, 1USD=6 to 6.5NOK.

http://www.norskstaal.no/varekatalog/prispdf/nost_aluminium.pdf

Example:
Aluminium skipsplater, EN AW 5052/5754-H24/H34 (733-1) - NOK/KG
Varenr Dimensjon Kg/plate <199KG >200KG >1000KG
733008 4,00 X 2000 X 5000 MM 112.00 49.80 43.57 33.62

As you see, the price is 33.62NOK/kg for 1000kg while it's 50NOK/kg for small quantities.