Kobe Steel Ltd. (Kobelco) revamped its No. 3 slab caster among five continuous casters (CC) at its Kakogawa Works. The two-strand slab caster, commissioned in 1984, produces 150,000 metric tons monthly of steel slabs (with a thickness of 230 mm and a width ranging from 850 to 1,800 mm) for coil and sheet grade steels. The 3 billion yen revamp will enable the caster to realize improved slab quality eligible for high quality automotive steel sheets. The revamp included converting a curved-mold-type machine into a vertical bending machine. This included the installation of electromagnetic stirrers in molds. Both items aim to reduce nonmetallic inclusions and defects caused by small gas bubbles in the molds. Formerly at the Kakogawa Works, the 4-1 CC exclusively supplied 100,000 metric tons monthly of high quality slabs for automotive steel sheets. Thus, the No. 3 caster revamp enables the works to realize improved productivity of high quality automotive sheet steels from 1.2 million metric tons to million metric tons annually.
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