AMETEK Land has collaborated with Danieli & C. Officine Meccaniche S.p.A. (Danieli) on automatic tapping system to increase operation safety and improve process control for steel plants.
Established in 1914, Danieli designs plants and manufactures and installs machines for the metals industry covering the entire production cycle from raw ore to finished steel products.
With the Danieli Automatic Electric Arc Furnace (EAF) Tapping System, it is possible to execute a complete furnace tapping remotely from the main pulpit of a steel plant. The system starts furnace tilting in automatic mode, controlling the furnace position during the complete tapping process.
Embedded within the system are two thermal imaging systems from AMETEK Land: its world-renowned Slag Detection System (SDS-E), branded as Danieli’s Q-Slag, and a near-infrared (NIR) fixed thermal imager that is an integral part of the Ladle Level Detection (LLD) system. The thermal imaging systems are used in conjunction with Danieli software to control steel flow in real time.
Q-Slag makes use of an SDS-E imager to detect the transition between steel and slag. It also quantifies the amount of slag that may pass into the ladle. That information is useful for fine-tuning alloys and lime additions for the secondary metallurgy. In parallel with Q-Slag, the LLD system controls when steel inside the teeming ladle has reached pre-set level positions.
Back tilting can be done either in automatic mode (when the pre-conditions regarding steel level and weight are met) or by remote intervention of the EAF operator from the main pulpit.
AMETEK Land NIR fixed thermal imager AMETEK Land’s selection by Danieli as development partner was based on Land’s 75 years of steel industry application expertise, along with the demonstrated ability of its Slag Detection System to improve operator response times and steel consistency at the end of each tap. Those improvements typically result in up to a 25% reduction in slag depths, compared with traditional methods of stream monitoring.
“We are delighted that Danieli selected AMETEK Land as a partner on their Automated Tapping System. There are major benefits for steel producers of using this technology,” comments Ben Wileman, Division Vice President, Sales and Marketing for AMETEK Land.
“Fast slag detection response allows plants to significantly reduce slag carryover, resulting in improved yields, higher quality steel, and a reduction in costly downstream processing.”
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