ITW Dyken
About ITW Dykem
ITW Dykem is a product brand operating under Illinois Tool Works Inc. (ITW), one of the world's most respected diversified manufacturing companies. ITW Dykem brings the engineering heritage and quality standards of a Fortune 300 global enterprise to the hands of machinists, fabricators, automotive technicians, and industrial professionals every day.
Illinois Tool Works itself has a history stretching back to 1912, when it was founded in Illinois. Today, the company employs tens of thousands of people across dozens of countries and holds tens of thousands of active and pending patents worldwide — a testament to its relentless focus on innovation and practical problem-solving across industries.
The DYKEM Legacy in Industrial Marking
The DYKEM line, marketed under the ITW Dykem brand name, has been a fixture in professional shops since 1920, when DYKEM Steel Blue layout fluid first entered the market. Since then, it has become the recognized industry standard for machinists who need to accurately scribe, mark, and measure metal surfaces before cutting, drilling, or machining.
The principle is straightforward but powerful: applying a thin coat of layout fluid to a bright metal surface creates a high-contrast, matte backdrop that makes scribe lines and measurement marks clearly visible. This seemingly simple innovation has saved countless hours of rework and improved precision across automotive parts manufacturing, aviation, marine fabrication, railroad maintenance, and general industrial MRO environments.
A Full Range of Marking Solutions
Beyond the iconic Steel Blue, the ITW Dykem product family covers a broad spectrum of marking and identification needs. Whether a professional needs to permanently mark metal, wood, glass, rubber, or ceramics, the lineup delivers vivid, durable color. Products are carefully formulated to provide reliable identification marks and color-coding — critical for tamper detection and verifying that settings or controls have not been changed in production or maintenance environments.
ITW Dykem products are also widely used for cross-check marking — a safety-critical application in transportation, rail, and aviation industries where fasteners, valves, and other components must be visually inspected for movement or loosening after installation.
Part of a World-Class Industrial Brand Family
As part of ITW's broader Pro Brands portfolio, ITW Dykem benefits from the research, distribution, and quality infrastructure of a global industrial leader. ITW operates across seven major business segments — including Automotive OEM, Polymers & Fluids, Welding, and Specialty Products — meaning that the engineering expertise behind every Dykem product is backed by over a century of manufacturing innovation. ITW's decentralized business model gives each brand the agility to focus specifically on the needs of its professional end-users, resulting in products that are refined, field-tested, and trusted by tradespeople around the world.
For professionals who demand precision, reliability, and consistency in every job, ITW Dykem delivers the kind of purpose-built industrial solutions that have stood the test of time.