South Africa has a well-developed steel industry with many companies making galvanized steel coils. These coils are known for their strength and clean finish. Local producers keep improving their methods and equipment to meet higher quality standards.
A galvanized steel coil is a steel sheet coated with zinc to protect it from rust and damage. The coating helps the steel last longer in different conditions. It has a smooth surface and is made in large rolls for easy processing.
Company | Year Founded | Country |
ArcelorMittal South Africa | 1928 | South Africa |
Safal Steel | 2006 | South Africa |
Duferco Steel Processing | 1999 | South Africa |
Macsteel | 1950 | South Africa |
Allied Steelrode | 2014 | South Africa |
BSi Steel | 1985 | South Africa |
Pro Roof Steel & Tube | 1988 | South Africa |
Steelbank | 1978 | South Africa |
Trident Steel | 1972 | South Africa |
Phoenix Steel | 1993 | South Africa |
ArcelorMittal South Africa
Year Founded: 1928
Main Products:
- Hot dip galvanized steel coils and sheets
- Cold rolled steel coils and sheets
- Hot rolled steel coils and sheets
- Structural grades of galvanized steel
- Steel grades including S350GD, S420GD, S450GD, and S550GD
- Specialty grades for automotive and industrial applications
ArcelorMittal South Africa is located in Vanderbijlpark, Gauteng, and that’s their main spot for flat steel. The company has been around a long time, starting way back in 1928. It used to be called Iscor, which was a company that the government started.
They made their first steel at the Pretoria Works in 1934. Iscor grew and built the Vanderbijlpark Works, which turned into a full steel factory by 1952. This plant could take raw iron ore and turn it into actual finished steel.
In 1996, Iscor helped build the Saldanha Steel Mill, which started working in 1998. The original Iscor was split up in 2001 into a mining part and a steel part. Mittal Steel Company bought the steel business and renamed it Mittal Steel Ltd. in 2004. It got its current name, ArcelorMittal South Africa, when two big companies joined together in 2006.
Now, this plant runs new galvanizing lines. These lines put a zinc coating on steel sheets by dipping them in hot zinc. This coating is great protection against rust, which is why it’s so useful for building things.
The steel they make meets several big standards, like SANS 4998. The factory can also make the zinc coating thicker or thinner, depending on what a customer needs. This steel is made to last a very long time, especially for roofing and walls.
Safal Steel
Year Founded: 2006
Main Products:
- Aluminium-Zinc coated steel coils
- Pre-painted coils with color coatings
- Unpainted aluminium-zinc coated coils
- High micron thickness coatings (up to 200 micron)
- Coated steel for roofing applications
- Coated steel for cladding applications
- Coated steel for structural construction applications
Safal Steel has a big metal coating factory in Cato Ridge, KwaZulu-Natal. It got started back in 2006.
It’s a piece of the larger Safal Group, which started in Kenya in 1962. Putting up the Safal Steel factory was the most expensive project the whole group had ever done.
It cost more than R1.5 billion. That price tag really shows how important this one factory is.
This plant is pretty unique. It’s the only one in Southern Africa that makes steel coils coated with a mix of aluminium and zinc. This special coating actually protects against rust better than regular galvanizing.
The factory also has lines to paint the steel. These were designed by experts to survive the region’s strong sun and wet weather.
A cool thing they do is make coatings that are 200 microns thick. Not many companies in the world can make it that thick. This coating gives awesome protection from rust.
Duferco Steel Processing
Year Founded: 1999
Main Products:
- Cold rolled steel coils
- Galvanized steel coils
- Full-hard steel coils
- Hot rolled pickled and oiled steel
- Steel products for export markets
- Specialty steel coils with precision finishes
Duferco Steel Processing is in Saldanha Bay, Western Cape. It’s really close, only 5 kilometers, from South Africa’s deepest natural port. They picked this spot for a good reason.
It helps them prepare hot-rolled coil to be sold in other countries. The company was started in 1999.
It was a team project between a Swiss company (Duferco SA) and South Africa’s IDC. They had the factory built and ready to go by the end of 1998.
They started working in 1999 and sent their first products to the UK and the US that same year. Shipping products that fast helped them get a name for good quality. Their main job is to add value to hot-rolled coil. This means they do things like pickling, cold rolling, and galvanizing the steel.
Macsteel
Year Founded: 1950
Main Products:
- Hot dipped galvanized steel coils
- Hot dipped galvanized steel sheets
- Hot rolled steel coils and sheets
- Cold rolled steel coils and sheets
- Pre-painted galvanized coils (PPGI)
- Pre-painted galvalume coils (PPGL)
- Cut-to-length services
- Blanking services
- Slitting services
- Edge trimming services
- Guillotining services
- Stretching and levelling services
Macsteel‘s headquarters is in Boksburg, Gauteng. It’s one of the biggest steel suppliers in all of South Africa.
The company has a really long history, starting in 1904 from two different businesses. They got into the steel business in 1950 when a man named Dave Samson started a company. His son, Eric, came to work with him later on.
A big moment happened in 1965 when they joined with S. Machanik & Co. This merger made the new company much stronger. In the 1970s, they changed the name to Macsteel. That “Mac” part actually came from the Machnik name.
This was also when they started to grow outside of South Africa. They grew really fast in the 1980s. They did this by buying six other companies, which turned them into a big international steel processor.
Today, Macsteel has a giant network with 8 business units and 50 service centers. They can supply steel to most countries in sub-Saharan Africa. They make, process, and sell a ton of different steel and aluminum items.
Allied Steelrode
Year Founded: 2014
Main Products:
- Hot rolled coils and sheets
- Cold rolled coils and sheets
- Galvanized ISQ230 coils and sheets (Z200 & Z275 coating weights)
- Electro-galvanised coils and sheets
- Hot dipped galvanised coils and sheets
- Enamelling quality steels
- Dual phase steels (high-strength ferritic-martensitic microstructure)
- Hot forming and hot stamping steels
- Cold formed structural sections
- Customized specialty steel products
Allied Steelrode is in KwaZulu-Natal. It was created in 2014 when two separate companies decided to merge, Steelrode and Allied Chemical and Steel.
This merger made a single, strong company. It quickly became the number one buyer of steel from ArcelorMittal South Africa.
It also brings in a lot of steel from other countries, which gives customers more choices. The plant can make over 500,000 tons of steel every single year.
They have their own 39 trucks to deliver steel as far as Bloemfontein and to other countries in Africa. This place is a top-notch service center. They do all kinds of things like de-coiling, slitting, and plasma cutting.
The company’s main idea is to be totally focused on quality. The boss, Arun Chadha, believes this is the most important part of good customer service. They are always trying to get better, not just stay where they are.
They try to hire good people and have everyone work as a team. This idea helped the company keep running even when other places had to stop for labor problems. They also train new managers to make sure the company stays strong.
BSi Steel
Year Founded: 1985
Main Products:
- Hot rolled coils and sheets
- Cold rolled coils and sheets
- Galvanized coils and sheets
- Galvalume coils and sheets
- Color-coated coils
- Electro-plated products
- Structural plates including boiler plates
- Corrugated, IBR, and wide-span roofing products
- Tubing products (round, square, and rectangular)
- Lipped channels and structural sections
- Reinforcing bars and long products
- Light and medium mill sections
- Cut-to-length services
- Slitting and precision blanking services
BSi Steel‘s main office is in Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal. They also have a giant 23-hectare central site in Klipriver.
A man named William Battershill started the company in May 1985. He started with just R2,000, which isn’t much.
At first, he sold rejected tubing to farmers. After a few years, Battershill started adding more products to sell.
He began selling to small engineering shops. In 1989, he bought the building he was renting, which meant he could keep more items in stock.
They started a big expansion in 1995 when they set up Garrison Steel in Gauteng. This got them into the biggest market in South Africa.
They started moving into other parts of Africa in 1997, starting with a branch in Zambia. After that, they opened branches in the DRC and Zimbabwe.
In 2001, they changed the name from Discount Steel to BSi Steel. A really big deal happened in 2007 when the company was listed on the stock exchange. This move raised R100 million. They used that money to buy the Klipriver land and build a huge new warehouse.
Pro Roof Steel & Tube
Year Founded: 1988
Main Products:
- Hot rolled structural tubing and sections
- Cold formed open sections (lip channels, purlins, channels, top hats, angles)
- Round, square, and rectangular hollow sections
- Galvanized sheets and coils
- Corrugated roofing sheets (Pro762)
- IBR roofing profiles (Pro686)
- Widespan roofing profiles (Prospan 762)
- Pre-painted roofing solutions
- Cold rolled sheets and coils
- Hot rolled sheets and coils
- Chromadek coated materials
- Aluzinc coated materials
- Flat steel products and structural sections
- Cut-to-length services
- Slitting services
- Decoiling and recoiling services
- Guillotining services
- Tube cutting services
Pro Roof Steel & Tube has its main office in Vereeniging, but it also has places in Pretoria and Cape Town. It’s one of the biggest and most famous steel sellers in Southern Africa.
A man named Rafik Mohamed started it in 1988. In the beginning, he did every single job himself, like driving, taking orders, and even accounting. He had noticed that a lot of people needed roof sheeting.
He got the credit he needed from a company called Wedge Steel to start his own business. Only six years later, in 1994, his company grew by adding cut-to-length and slitting lines.
They added a plant for cold-formed sections in 1997 and began exporting products in 1998. The Cape Town branch opened up in 1999, and they also started to make steel tubes.
The company is managed in a very hands-on way. They watch costs and how much work gets done very closely. The leaders there believe the company’s success is all thanks to its people.
In 2018, Pro Roof Steel spent a lot of money on a new project in Meyerton. They bought a 57-hectare piece of land and built a giant, new factory. This new place is called SA Steel Mills.
Steelbank
Year Founded: 1978
Main Products:
- Hot rolled steel coils and sheets
- Cold rolled steel coils and sheets
- Galvanized coils and sheets
- Stainless steel products
- Aluminum products
- Flat steel products and components processed from coil
- Cut-to-length services
- Slitting services
- Guillotining services
- Precision cut steel components
- Sheet and plate products
Steelbank‘s main spot is in Pinetown, Durban. It also has big plants in Gauteng and the Western Cape, putting it right in South Africa’s main industrial zones.
The company was purchased in 1978 by Mr. Roy Meaker, and he is still a director today. His son, Lloyd Meaker, has been the Group Chairman since 1997.
Leon Freese has been the Group Managing Director for a long time, since 1982. In 1990, the company decided to change what it focused on.
It decided to focus on keeping flat steel in stock and servicing it. This turned into its main business. In 2007, Steelbank bought another company in Gauteng called Metpar.
They started upgrading the new place right away and renamed it Steelbank (Gauteng). The company had also opened a branch in Cape Town back in 2000. That branch got bigger and had to move to a new, larger building in 2012.
In 2011, Steelbank tried a new idea and opened a separate company in Cape Town. This new business focused only on selling stainless steel and aluminum. It turned out to be a very successful idea.
Trident Steel
Year Founded: 1972
Main Products:
- Hot-rolled steel coils and sheets (dry or pickled & oiled)
- Cold-rolled steel coils and sheets
- Galvanised coils and sheets
- Electrogalvanized coils and sheets
- Stainless steel coils and sheets
- Specialty and high-strength automotive steels
- Dual-phase and complex steels
- Carbon, alloy, and spring steels
- Pressed blanks and guillotined parts
- Cut-to-length services
- Edge dressing services
- Trapezoidal and pressed blanks
- Tubular products
- Cropped and peeled spring steels
- De-coiling and re-coiling services
- Ultrasonic, hardness, and spectrographic testing services
Trident Steel is located in Roodekop, Germiston. This is in the Gauteng province, which is a big area for heavy industry and cars.
The company’s story starts in 1972 as a business that sold steel. But the official company, Trident Engineering, was actually started a little earlier, in 1969.
It was started by three men: Roger Calvert, John Curnick, and Richard Curnick. In 1997, Trident teamed up with another company to build Goodman locomotives.
That same year, they also got the rights to the Eimco Rocker Shovel loaders. The company changed again in 2003 when it got the rights to make all new Goodman equipment for the whole world.
In 2010, Trident joined the MOGS group. This was a big move that made it a BBBEE company. Today, Trident Steel is a top service center for specialty steel, especially for cars.
The main plant in Roodekop works with many types of steel coils. This includes hot-rolled, cold-rolled, galvanized, and stainless steel. The steel gets cut up into sheets, strips, and custom shapes.
They opened another plant in Port Elizabeth in 2001. This huge plant has some of the newest steel processing machines in the country. It’s also located very close to two major ports.
Phoenix Steel
Year Founded: 1993
Main Products:
- Hot rolled steel coils and sheets
- Cold rolled steel coils and sheets
- Galvanized steel coils and sheets
- Pre-painted galvanized coils (PPGI)
- Structural steel sections
- Universal beams and columns
- IPE sections
- Round, square, and rectangular tubing
- Stainless steel products
- Special steel products
- Plates in various grades (S355, 430A Boiler, SS10/200 Bennox, hot rolled, cold rolled, galvanized, PPGI)
- Slitting services
- Blanking services
- Cut-to-length services
- Tube manufacturing services
- Lipped channel services
- Flame cutting services
- Plasma cutting services
- Laser cutting services
- Guillotining services
- Bending services
Phoenix Steel is one of the biggest steel traders in South Africa. It has branches in most of the country’s main industrial cities. The company itself got started in 1993.
It is now owned by a company called Argent Industrial Limited. Argent Industrial is a bigger company in Durban that does both manufacturing and steel trading.
This company sells a wide range of steel products. This includes normal steel, stainless steel, and special steels. Their product list has coils, sheets, beams, tubes, and plates.
Phoenix Steel does a lot more than just sell steel. It also offers a bunch of processing services for its customers. This includes slitting, blanking, cutting steel to a certain length, and even making tubes.
Conclusion
Galvanized steel coils continue to play a key role in modern production. Their balance of strength and protection makes them dependable for many uses. They stay in steady demand as industries keep relying on strong, coated steel.
