Ian Sellars, the owner and managing director of Elcometer and one of the founders of the modern coatings inspection industry, passed away on April 10.

Sellars’ earliest memory of the coatings industry was at the age of nine, watching his father make the first manufacturing tool used in the manufacture of the very first gauge that bore this famous company name, the Elcometer 101. Sellars began working alongside his father in 1958, where his first job was assembling the valves into the Elcometer 103 mk1 “Elcotector” coating thickness gauge. In 1962, upon the death of his father, Sellars took control of Elcometer, at the age of 23.

For nearly 50, years Ian Sellars steered the family business from a small 370 ft2 office employing 7 people, into a global manufacturer and supplier of inspection equipment for the coatings and concrete industries employing more than 200 staff in six offices and a global network of over 150 distributors.

Under his direction, Elcometer won a Queen’s Award for Export and a Queen’s Award for Technical Innovation. It was his practice to undertake at least one major tour of the distribution network and offices each year, and it was on such a trip that he died peacefully in his sleep on an aircraft traveling with his wife Nanette, from India to Singapore.

His son Michael has been working with his father in the business for last 13 years. Elcometer will continue under his leadership, with the help of Nanette.

The company’s website is at www.elcometer.com.