Why Alexander Cylinder Solutions?

A Vision to be a Committed Partner in Our Customers’ Success
 

As we look forward to the opening of our brand new, state of the art, $14M cylinder recertification and refurbishment facility in July 2025, we wanted to share our vision of combining decades of knowledge and experience with today’s highly advanced technology tools to deliver a new generation of cylinder services.

Let’s take a look at several pivotal factors that went into the decision to transform our cylinder business into its own highly sophisticated, specialty division – Alexander Cylinder Solutions.

Rethinking Gas Cylinder Recertification 

 

Historically, the gold standard for the recertification process centered around hydrostatic testing, which measures the “stretch” of a gas cylinder when it is over pressurized. Although there have been advancements in this form of testing technology, the process continues to be highly antiquated.

In our experience and through research, we have found that hydrostatic testing does not adequately determine the inherent safety of a pressurized vessel. Simply evaluating the expansion and contraction of metal is not an accurate indicator of potential cylinder structural integrity issues.

In addition, some cylinders we service are decades old, and have been exposed to a wide array of environments and often improper levels of care while being transported or moved.

We have concluded over time that the ultimate cause of gas cylinder failure is due to external and internal corrosion, vibration, fatigue, as well as other factors that are undetectable during hydrostatic testing.

As a company, we feel an obligation to find a better way to test gas cylinders, and hope that our multi-million-dollar new plant and technology investment will demonstrate to our customers the commitment Alexander Cylinder Solutions has to their safety and business success.

Maximizing Efficiency Through Automation

 

The next priority of our new venture is to drastically improve the turnaround times for recertifying and refurbishing our customers’ gas cylinders.

Always with the goal in mind to maximize cylinder performance and service-life, we found that our complicated and multi-step refurbishment process was inefficient, time consuming, and physically demanding for our highly skilled workforce.

Our team had to find a better way to do business, so we could provide the utmost value to our customers’ gas cylinder maintenance programs. After studying several solution possibilities, we concluded that leveraging the latest in today’s automation technology was the best path forward.

If We Build It, Will They Come?

 

The next step in our transformational business process was to determine if there is a demand in the marketplace for our new service capabilities.

After multiple rounds of business concept due diligence with engineering firms, draft designs, and interviews with original equipment manufacturers, we met with customers to determine their capacity limitations, and whether they felt our wide variety of cylinder services would be of value as an overflow resource.

The resounding answer to this question was “YES!”. We were confident that our new automation strategy would be an ideal solution for capacity and efficient turnaround times, since it had been proven to grow throughput 10x from our formal manual processes.

Additionally, our sophisticated internal wash, NDE testing and new powder-coat paint applications would exceed expectations for quality.

We also decided to engage an existing partner to add sophisticated tracking to our massive cylinder fleet. What evolved from these efforts is industry leading live, asset-tracking capabilities with a customer portal to access pictures, videos, and test results for each cylinder. As well as a fleet management system with automated notifications, pickup and delivery services, and Ready-To-Fill onsite storage.

Of equal importance, we also learned during customer and end user interviews that the need for a gas cylinder service partner that provided transparency, trust, confidence, capacity, and efficient turnaround times was a top priority.

Consequently, we commissioned a study with industry experts to further explore the market opportunities of our new capabilities and services. We found the results of the study very encouraging.

It was from these combined efforts that the plans for Alexander Cylinder Solutions, a specialty division of Alexander Chemical took flight.

Ready to Contribute to Our Customers’ Success

 

Alexander Cylinder Solutions is proud to provide these highly advanced and industry leading gas cylinder services as of July 2025.

And our comprehensive services to ease customer’s management and administration of their cylinder fleet are:

Proud of Our Past, Ready for a Bright Future

 

We cordially invite you to visit and tour our new state-of-the-art gas cylinder services facility. Join us as we provide an in-depth look at our processes, and how they can maximize your company’s efficiency, productivity, and success.

Call us today to schedule a tour and book a slot for your cylinders. Our weekly production calendar is already filling up!

We look forward to your continued partnership.

Thank You,   

Robert Davidson
President & CEO

Contact Us Today