EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION INTO IMPROVED WRAPPER CONTROL OF HOT STRIP STEEL ROLLING MILL DOWNCOILERS

With increasing international competition in steel production mainly from developing nations, it is important for steel plants to keep up to date with new technologies, and continuously improve on current practices and manufacturing techniques to remain competitive. This paper looks specifically at improvements to the hot rolling mill downcoilers, which is where the strip is coiled at the end of the rolling process. Hydraulic and pneumatic technology is combined to give accurate position control of guide wrappers that aid the initial coiling process. The paper presents an experimental test rig, using an actual wrapper guide, constructed to evaluate the specific design approach.