Team News Riveting
Raipur, February 6
The Rail and Structural Mill of SAIL-Bhilai Steel Plant (BSP) had successfully rolled out for the first time 125 square billets from blooms of section 320×340 mm from Caster No 4 of Steel Melting Shop (SMS) 2 to enhance TMT production from merchant mill.
On February 4, 2021, 256 such blooms were rolled into billets with total tonnage at 1046 Tonnes. This is part of a new initiative taken by SAIL-Bhilai Steel Plant to enhance availability of billets for increasing production of TMT grade bars in the Plant’s Merchant Mill so as to tap into the current surge in demand for TMT Bars in the country.
It may be recalled that successful trial rolling of billets of 125 x 125 dimension had been carried out at Rail & Structural Mill (RSM) on 26th Jan 2021 from blooms produced at Steel Melting Shop 3 (SMS 3).
Rolling of TMT 32 bars from125 square billets obtained from SAIL’s Durgapur Steel Plant had earlier been carried out successfully at Merchant Mill, following which the Plant’s RSM took up the challenge of rolling blooms into 125 sq. billets by incorporating changes in roll pass design of RSM.
While the RTS and RPDB teams modified roll pass design, the RSM team modified guides and made other necessary modifications including setting up attachment in cooling beds to keep billets straight and arrangements to cut the billets to specified size etc. The entire RSM, RTS & RPDB team worked together to make the Stands ready for in-house rolling of blooms into 125 square billets.
On January 26, 2021, RSM had rolled 24 numbers of blooms from SMS 3 into billets. It was for the first time that cast blooms produced through the continuous casting route were rolled into billets at the Plant’s Rail & Structural Mill. Blooms from SMS 2 rolled into billets at RSM on February 4, 2021 were of bigger section. As compared to blooms of 320×340 mm section supplied by SMS 2, blooms from SMS 3 rolled on January 26,2021 were of 300×335 mm section. For Rail Mill, rolling blooms of both these sections was a challenge.
What is also significant about rolling at RSM on February 4, 2021 is that MES ERP has been enabled. These billets will now be rolled into TMT bars in Merchant Mill. The strategy to roll billets at RSM from blooms produced in SMS 2 has been taken under the leadership of Director I/c SAIL Bhilai Steel Plant and guidance of Executive Director (Works) so as to enable the Plant to increase production of TMT to meet the demands.
