Siemens VAI Metals Technologies, Linz, Austria:

A. Flick, Vice President for Continuous Casting, andreas.flick@siemens.com

Ch. Stoiber, Dr., Vice President for Continuous Casting BA

Today continuous casters consist of modularized technological/mechatronic packages to allow fast design and short project execution time as well as rapid production ramp-up after the first heat has been cast. From the metallurgical point of view state-of-the-art continuous casters have features to enable strand treatment through special cooling and soft reduction technologies. Sophisticated process models allow on-line process simulation and close loop control to further optimize product quality and productivity goals. Robotic units perform tasks in hazardous areas and improve operational reliability without human intervention.The speed of innovation has been outstanding in continuous casting since its start of commercialization in the 1950s. Different to other processes in steel production, continuous casting is the vital link between the liquid and the solid phase and has tolive with metallurgical effects as well as mechanical challenges at the same time. Visions and the first attempts of development of this process during 1960s and 1970s as well as benchmarks in the 1980s are observed. Current basic directions of development of continuous casting are analyzed; they include e.g. development of disruptive technologies, mechatronic revolution, usage of thicker plates and enlarged section sizes, optimal conditions of solidification, dynamic roller gap and increase of serviceability. Commodity casters for developing markets and specialized casters for endless rolling operation are discussed. They led to processes and steady improvements and this experience givesus certainty that casting technology will continue to develop through innovation and by using the engineering power of suppliers and operators in the years to come.

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