Salt Cell Price increases

[chlorinatorpro]

Just giving everyone a heads up here , you are likely going to see a large price increase on salt cells sooner rather than later. The price of Ruthenium which is the main precious material coated on to the titanium plates has seen a price increase of 400% over the past 9 months. The other mineral, Iridium ,has gone up by 40%. It's entirely possibly you could see retail prices increasing 50-100% soon. Depends on everybody's inventory levels and/or how much cost sellers what to absorb . All manufacturers are going to have this issue.

Ruthenium is mainly used by capacitor and hard disk drive manufacturers who get very skittish when they sense a supply shortage and tend to try and corner the market so they have the necessary supply for their products.

 

[YippeeSkippy]

interesting. very interesting.

Thanks.

Maddie

 

[JamesW]

How much ruthenium is in a cell and how much does it add to the price of the cell?

What is the price of ruthenium?

 

[chlorinatorpro]

http://www.infomine.com/investment/metal-prices/ruthenium/

The coverage of the titanium plates is about 80/20 ruthenium/iridium oxide. When the price of the ruthenium part increases 400% it's obvious that prices for the entire cell has to increase. The plates alone for a T-15 cell cost $200 now where as last year they were only about $50-60. Then there is the housing, electronics, cord and al the other fixed expenses before companies even get to their marketing expenses and overhead.

Since there are only a couple of suppliers for coating plates there is no room for price negotiations. Suppliers of the cells will simply pass the costs on to customers. Some won't realize how good they have had it for the past five years. There is going to be a new normal soon IMO.
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