A long-standing partnership

By: Trailer Magazine

Capral Aluminium has built a solid reputation in the transport industry for providing trailer manufacturers with strong yet lightweight building materials.
One of these manufacturers is Sloanebuilt, based at Smeaton Grange in south-west Sydney.

According to company owner, Fred Marano, Capral Aluminium takes care of all the company’s needs in terms of the supply of aluminium materials, enabling Sloanebuilt to fully concentrate on building high quality trailers for its customers.
“Capral has a very strong management team that takes great pride in looking after our account holistically which means we don’t need to micromanage it,” Fred says.
“The company offers us a good, reliable supply of aluminium and has never let us down over the entire 15 years we’ve been buying product from them.”

Fred says the main aluminium products he buys from Capral are plate and extrusions and that both companies work closely with research and development (R&D) initiatives in the interests of continuous product improvement.

“We don’t use any other aluminium supplier and Capral has been very accommodating in supplying our R&D department with what they need,” Fred says. “We appreciate the input from Capral’s mill and technical division when developing new products for our range; they work hand-in-hand with us on these projects to ensure we get the best outcomes.”

According to Capral’s Sales & Market Manager – Industrial Products, Mark Murray, customer demands have shaped much of the heavy investments that Capral has made in its state-of-the-art national facilities comprising six extrusion plants operating nine press lines and three powder coating lines.

“It’s generally understood that we can supply long length extrusions up to 17m and long length plate up to 12m, but what many in the industry don’t realise is that we also have developed a comprehensive range of value-added capabilities throughout our extensive network to help us meet the specific needs of our customers,” Mark says.

“Our value-add capabilities not only allow us to provide the exact aluminium components our customers require in all shapes and sizes, but also a more streamlined means to a final product, when they need it.”

Capral’s distribution network across Australia means its aluminium components can be supplied ‘just-in-time’ via its next day delivery service, which helps customers like Sloanebuilt reduce stock inventory, warehouse space and manufacturing time.
Mark explains that Capral has the ability to offer its customers a vast range of tailored products such as cut to length extrusions including slotted, routed, drilled, punched, mitre cut, knurled and de-burred, as well as sheet and plate routing and cutting.

“We supply individual pieces or full kits for a wide range of trailer and body varieties including tippers, refrigerated trailers, flat tops, ute trays, recreational vehicles and pantechs,” he says. “More and more transport sectors are seeing the benefits of integrating our lightweight materials into their designs.”