The company’s Technology Center features a 200-ton capacity crane, 75 machining centers,
in-house stress relieving facilities and an active, covered rail spur.

Hot rolling is used mainly to produce sheet metal through a metalworking process that occurs above the recrystallization temperature of the material. After the metal’s grains deform during regular processing, they recrystallize, which maintains an equiaxed microstructure and prevents the metal from work hardening. The original material is usually large pieces of metal, like semi-finished casting products (slabs, blooms, and billets). If these products originate from a continuous casting operation, the products are usually fed directly into the rolling mills at the proper temperature. In smaller operations, the material begins at room temperature and must be heated in a gas- or oil-fired soaking pit (larger pieces) or induction heating (smaller pieces). As the material is worked, the temperature must be monitored to make sure it remains above the recrystallization temperature. A finishing temperature is defined above the recrystallization temperature at usually 50 to 100 °C (122 to 212 °F) above the recrystallization temperature. If the temperature does drop below this temperature, then the material must be re-heated before additional hot rolling.

The complete integration and testing of the equipment prior to shipment ensures the delivery of a high-quality, fully-functional product, enabling quick startups, shorter outages and faster ramp-up into full production.

The Electrical and Automation Group has a wide range of in-depth experience in the metals processing industry. This experience includes power distribution, AC/DC drives, motion control, modeling, data acquisition and visualization for both new equipment, upgrades and retrofits of existing lines.