Reliance Steel & Aluminum of Los Angeles, the second-largest metals service center in North America, is buying Clayton Metals of Wood Dale, Ill. Clayton specializes in the processing and distribution of aluminum, stainless steel and red metal flat-rolled products, custom extrusions and aluminum circles at locations in Wood Dale, Ill.; Cerritos, Calif.; High Point, N.C. and Parsippany, N.J. Clayton Metal's net sales in 2006 were $123 million. By comparison, Reliance Steel had 2006 sales of $5.74 billion.

Namasco of Roswell, Ga., the 12th largest metals service center in North America, has expanded by acquiring Primary Steel of Middletown, Conn. and Premier Steel of Shreveport, La. Namasco, owned by German steel distribution group Klöckner & Co. Premier had $1.2 billion in sales in 2006, according to Purchasing's Top 100 Service Centers listing. Primary had sales of $509 million in 2006 while Premier Steel had sales of $30 million.

Steelmaker Steel Dynamics Inc. is spending $360 million to buy GalvTech, MetalTech and NexTech. Known together as "The Techs," these Pittsburgh-based firms have galvanizing capacity of 1 million tons/year, almost doubling SDI's hot-dip galvanizing capacity at Butler and Jeffersonville, Ind.

Carpenter Technology has broken ground for a $115 million facility in Reading, Pa., to expand its melt capacity by 40% of premium-grade specialty alloys marketed for critical applications in the aerospace, energy, medical and automotive industries. The expansion of melt capacity and related infrastructure is expected to be completed by late 2009.

Alcoa has restarted a potline at its Alcoa, Tenn., aluminum smelter that had been idled due to a direct lightning strike in mid-April. Partially smelted alumina had to be dug out of each of the unit's 164 pots, which then had to be repaired. The potline produces approximately 107,000 metric tons/year. The company has also plans to restart operations during the fourth quarter at its Rockdale, Tex., smelter.

Algoma Steel of Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, now is a wholly owned subsidiary of Essar Steel Holdings of India, which acquired the Canadian steelmaker for $1.74 billion. Denis Turcotte continues as CEO of Algoma Steel.

Kaiser Aluminum will spend $34 million on equipment to increase production capacity for heat-treated metal plate at the company's Trentwood rolling mill. The Spokane-area mill makes heat-treated sheet and plate products for aerospace, transportation and industrial uses. This plate-upgrade investment is in addition to $105 million in upgrades that are already underway at the mill by the Foothill Ranch, Calif.-based firm.

Alcoa's new Fjardaál aluminum smelter was opened in early June on Iceland's east coast near the 700-person town of Reydarfjordur. The smelter will be working at full capacity by the end of the year. Fjardaál means "aluminum of the fjords."