In December 2022 AIC India received the order from one of the Stainless-Steel manufacturers in western India to overcome problems regarding control systems of Existing Pendulum Shear and Dividing shears.
Yield improvement is a crucial issue for any steel plant, since poor yield performance can negatively affect both the steel plant output and production cost and the Management of yield performance is vital for overall steel mill cost control. In December 2022 AIC India received the order from one of the Stainless-Steel manufacturers in western India to overcome problems regarding control systems of Existing Pendulum Shear and Dividing shears. The target of the upgrade was to:
- Eliminate the missing tail cut;
- Reduce the length variation at Pendulum Shear;
- Optimization of the Dividing shear to reduce waste and improve mill availability by eliminating the cobbles in the finishing area;
- Reduce wear and tear of mechanical and electrical equipment due to controlled shear trajectories to achieve best utilization of process requirements and overall equipment limitations.
The scope of supply consists in:
- Advanced Motion controller from Siemens;
- Axes control to optimize motor usage;
- Integration with the existing system over Profibus.
The System was put in operation in April 2023 and the performance of the implemented motion control system has exceeded the expectations of the customer:
1. High cutting accuracy and repeatability as well as cutting optimization strategy: The system automatically calculates an optimal cutting strategy to minimize material scrapping. This system can also take advantage of a pre-optimization shear to scrap the material in the middle of the rolling process;
2. Cut cycle simulation: The system allows the operator to simulate the presence of a billet, with a prearranged length, in transit in the rolling mill at the selected line speed. Through the simulation it is possible to verify the correct operation of every machine involved in the cutting cycle;
3. Complete process optimization, including shear control, cooling bed, finishing and delivery area optimization for aprons;
4. Performance of all Shears has improved significantly, since cut-to-cut variation of length has been minimized. Therefore, the monthly percentage of crops has been reduced.
