About Us
Troy Tack, President and Founder, Tactical Alloys
Troy is from Colorado and played all sports growing up, with football leading to a scholarship at the Colorado School of Mines. He has a B.S. and M.S. in Metallurgical Engineering. He has coached about 30 sports seasons in girls and boys lacrosse, basketball and football and understands the demands of an athlete and how to improve strength and speed via training. His career has an emphasis on inventing and developing advanced alloys for applications such as aerospace alloys, military equipment, baseball
and softball bats, firearms, lacrosse shafts, bicycles and golf equipment. Specific details of these endeavors are listed below.
Ben Tack, Distribution and Sales, Tactical Alloys
Ben was born in Howard County Maryland, played lacrosse starting at age 6 and then played in Montana after moving west in 2010. Ben excelled in football as a running back for the Hamilton (MT) Broncs, scoring 12 touchdowns and finishing in the top 3 in the state of Montana for rushing yards and scoring for an 11-0 team that made it deep into the playoffs. He is attending Montana State University and pursuing a degree in Marketing. His responsibilities include distribution and sales and marketing of the Tactical Alloys brand lacrosse shafts.
Here are few of my favorite endeavors from the past. I credit my professors, professional mentors and colleagues that influenced my professional development.
Aerospace Aluminum Lithium Alloy 2195 – The original alloy developed by scientists at Lockheed Martin had a remarkable yield strength of over 100,000 psi, one of the strongest alloys ever on a pound for pound basis. Around this time, the International Space Station was to be built, but a substantial weight reduction in the Space Shuttle was required to increase the payload capability while reaching the 250-mile orbit for payload delivery. I managed the alloy optimization program for alloy 2195 to enable welding fabrication and to attain the critical fracture toughness and yield strength properties down to liquid hydrogen temperatures (-423oF), plus, maintain compatibility with liquid oxygen. The program was scored at 96%, the highest score among all R&D programs, resulted in a $350M contract award and ultimately reduced the weight of the Space Shuttle by a critical 7000 pounds.
Scandium Alloys – In the early 1990’s, I was hired to “create” a market for the rare element scandium, which had a worldwide market of just a few pounds per year at the time! This was a very intriguing assignment that began with frequent travel to Russia and Ukraine, the development of scandium alloy programs utilizing 80 to 100 scientists throughout the prestigious Ukrainian research institutes, and working with a very diversified portfolio of companies including aerospace companies Boeing and Israel Aircraft Industries, sports equipment companies Easton, Taylor Made, True Temper Golf, STX, DeMarini, Nike, Rawlings and automotive companies Norsk Hydro and Daimler Benz, and firearm company Smith & Wesson. The various alloy formulations revolutionized the baseball and softball bat industry beginning with the launch of Easton’s “Redline” scandium bats, and resulted in super lightweight bicycle frames and bicycle components. In one remarkable development, scandium alloys proved highly resistance to impact loads and were then used in high caliber handgun frames – thus enabling the gun weight to be reduced by about one-half!
Titanium Alloys – The M777 Howitzer is 42% lighter than its predecessor due to the use of titanium, but once the initial prototypes were developed, the overall program was approximately $30 million over budget. I managed a Department of Defense ManTech program to convert complex welded M777 components into single piece investment castings, plus, the entire supply chain was optimized to foster competition. The end result was a $40M cost savings to the program. This program provided a 10:1 investment return and was critical in assisting the entire program to cut costs.
Contact Us:
Tactical Alloys
PO Box 920
Condon, MT 59826
Ph: 406-369-5546
