Scandium International Mining Corp (SCY)

[TMLonggun]

Thanks for the correction. Rivets or no rivets the aircraft industry could certainly benefit from scandium alloy components. Please feel free to comment on this, since you have experience in the field. Even if it is only used in the fuselage and wing paneling it seems like something the industry would desire. Who wouldn't want stronger, lighter planes?

Here's some more stuff I found:

"At present, aluminium is used in the aviation industry everywhere in the world. From two thirds to three quarters of a passenger plane’s dry weight, and from one twentieth to half of a rocket’s dry weight accounts for the share of aluminium in airborne craft. The casing of the first Soviet satellite was made of aluminium alloys. The body casing of American ‘Avantgarde’ and ‘Titan’ rockets used for launching the first American rockets into the orbit, and later on – spaceships, was also made of aluminium alloys. They are used for manufacturing various components of spaceship equipment: brackets, fixtures, chassis, covers and casing for many tools and devices."

http://www.aluminiumleader.com/en/around/transport/aircraft


How much aluminum is in a Boeing 747 airplane?

A 747-400 consists of 147,000 pounds (66,150 kg) of high-strength aluminum.

So at .1% alloy at $1k/kg that is an extra ~60k extra expense or about 1/3 the value of the aluminum. At 2k/kg the scandium would cost slightly less than the aluminum. Uh oh, that seems like a high proportion except when you consider that a 747 is worth almost $400 million new so suddenly a couple hundred thousand in raw materials seems trivial given the value add and even just the PR value of doing something like this will be enormous, economic benefits notwithstanding.